Mike Bettinger

Bettinger, a partner at Sidley Austin LLP, said that thinking on his feet helped him secure his most prominent trial win of the year.

Texas-based Biscotti Inc. designed video chatting systems to display on televisions and had a patented video calling program. It sued Microsoft Corp., claiming that making Skype calls on Xbox gaming systems infringed its patent. Bettinger defended the software giant. Biscotti Inc. v. Microsoft Corp., 13-CV01015 (E.D. Tex., filed Nov. 26, 2013).

The jury found that Xbox did not infringe and that the patent was invalid. Bettinger led the Sidley team to the first jury win for Microsoft in the Eastern District of Texas.

“What happens in trial is your best plans get thrown out the window,” he said. Bettinger said that to revise his original plan, he made an effort to listen closely to what is happening in the courtroom to get a sense of how jurors are perceiving the trial.

Bettinger said after the opposing counsel’s infringement expert laid out his case, he was able to capitalize on the way the expert characterized the technology to bolster his client’s argument for noninfringement.

“When he explained the technology, he did it in such a way that it was in line with our noninfringement [argument],” Bettinger said.

Biscotti sought more than $100 million in damages and an injunction.

“To be able to get that verdict down there when everyone thought we weren’t gonna be able to do it — that was the most rewarding,” he said.

Bettinger said that he had ample feedback from his team, including Microsoft’s in-house counsel on the case, and that this preparation paved the way for the jury verdict last June.

He said that he feels it is vital to make highly technical information accessible to the jury.

Bettinger said that he aims to focus on “how to take technical concepts and explain them to an everyday jury while still getting the technology right.”

“What you strive to do is to relate to folks. ... you’ve got to remember your audience,” he said. “It’s everyday people and you’ve got to keep that in mind.”

Besides the Microsoft case, Bettinger has been busy working on a case for his client Huawei Technologies Co., a Chinese telecommunications equipment company.

The case, which involves Huawei’s offer to license its portfolio on fair, reasonable and nondiscriminatory terms to Samsung, is set to go to trial later this year in San Francisco.

— Caroline Hart