Diane M. Doolittle

As co-chair of the firm's national trial practice group, Doolittle said she had three memorable trials in 2015. "Two wins and a draw," she summed up. On behalf of client AngioScore Inc., a leading maker of balloon catheters to treat cardiovascular conditions, she successfully sued rival TriReme Medical LLC and its founder, Eitan Konstantino, who had also founded AngioScore and served on its board. The plaintiff's contention was that Konstantino had designed a new catheter, and profited by it through TriReme.

"Instead of offering it to his original corporation as a business opportunity, he took it for himself and got sued," Doolittle said. U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers of Oakland, following a six-day bench trial, sided with Doolittle and the plaintiffs. She found Konstantino had breached his fiduciary duty to AngioScore and violated California's unfair competition statutes. Rogers ordered him to disgorge any profits he earned from the device and told TriReme to pay $20 million.

Doolittle's second key win came after client Pfizer Inc. was granted a new trial on appeal after a $39 million loss from 2008 in Santa Clara County Superior Court over trade secrets related to the painkiller Bextra it allegedly stole from a research group. Following an eight-week jury retrial, Pfizer was largely exonerated, she said, though a co-defendant was found liable.

"The jury rejected 155 of the 162 claims of alleged misappropriation, finding Pfizer liable on an agency theory for only seven files," Doolittle said. "In a case where the claim for damages approached nearly $1 billion at one point, the post-trial exposure is de minimus." A damages phase is set for later this year.

For social media client Pinterest Inc., Doolittle was unable to persuade a San Francisco federal judge that another company infringed its trademarked name. U.S District Judge Haywood S. Gilliam Jr. held that Pinterest's use of "pin" involved a word too common for him to reach an infringement question regarding its use by the much smaller travel app company, Pintrips. "I was hired 72 hours before the trial," Doolittle said. "Both sides' affirmative claims were rejected, but my client came out with its name intact. So that was a draw."

Most recently Doolittle has been retained by prominent venture capitalist Michael Goguen. The former managing partner at Sequoia Capital has counterclaimed that his ex-lover broke a $40 million settlement agreement to keep his name out of the headlines. In what looks to be an epic confrontation, Doolittle's high-powered opposing counsel, Patricia L. Glaser, is representing the woman, Amber Laurel Baptiste, whose original suit alleged breach of contract. Doolittle declined to comment on the matter.

John Roemer