Mark A. Lemley

As both a Stanford Law School professor and Durie Tangri attorney, Lemley is in a unique position to offer both insight and foresight into legal trends and happenings.

Last year, he scored several key victories at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit.

In a substantial win for his client, Newegg Inc., an online technology retailer, Lemley persuaded a Federal Circuit panel in July that an Eastern District of Texas judge wrongly denied attorney fees after the plaintiff, Acacia Research Corp. subsidiary Adjustacam LLC, dropped its patent infringement case after an unfavorable claim construction ruling.

“This was a case in which Newegg sought attorney fees against a patent troll,” Lemley said.

Adjustacam “dropped the case against Newegg once they realized they were going to lose,” he said. The appellate court ordered U.S. District Judge Rodney Gilstrap to award Newegg attorney fees. Adjustacam LLC v. Newegg Inc., 2016-1882 (Fed. Cir., filed July 5, 2017).

Lemley has won his last eight Federal Circuit appeals over the past few years.

He credits his success with his ability to listen and adapt to the intellectual climate of a given case and courtroom.

“I think one of the things a good appellate lawyer does is listen to the judges, and listen to the questions,” he said. “There’s a natural tendency to view this as your day in the sun and your time to tell your story, and that’s exactly the wrong way to think about it. ... It’s not about you.”

Lemley shuns a prepared script, saying it is misses the point of an oral argument on appeal.

As an academic, Lemley said that he enjoyed teaching a class on video game law in the past year. The class touched on a wide variety of legal issues.

In court, Lemley said that his work arguing the appeal at the Federal Circuit for client Blue Coat Systems, now owned by Symantec Corp., was one of the highlights of the past year. Finjan Inc. v. Blue Coat Systems Inc., 2016-2520 (Fed. Cir. 2018).

He persuaded the appellate damages to remand the damages verdict to district court on a key Finjan patent while invalidating another patent. As a result, a San Jose federal judge granted a mistrial in another Finjan patent infringement lawsuit.

The case settled in March when Symantec agreed to pay $65 million to Finjan for a license to its patents.

— Caroline Hart