Matthew D. Powers

Patent litigation

Powers, one of California's star patent litigators, always ends up in the middle of some of the technology industry's biggest legal battles.

He just finished arguing a major patent case before the U.S. International Trade Commission in Washington, D.C., defending Apple Inc. against patent infringement claims filed by Eastman Kodak Co. seeking to block the importation of Apple mobile phones with digital cameras included. Apple has filed a counterclaim against Kodak in the ITC.

Powers will argue on behalf of memory chip manufacturer Micron Technology Inc. before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit against Los Altos-based chip designer Rambus Inc. in a closely-watched battle that could decide the fate of their long-running patent dispute. Micron argues that Rambus' infringement claims should be rejected because its executives destroyed documents. District judges in Delaware and California already have come to opposite conclusions.

Last year, Powers won a major patent infringement case for Merck & Co. Inc. when a New Jersey judge decided that Teva Pharmaceuticals Industries Ltd. infringed Merck's patent when it started selling a generic version of a popular asthma drug.