Brett M. Schuman

During an average week, Schuman works on matters cutting across a broad swath of intellectual property disciplines, including unprecedented issues raised by the tensions between conflicting state and federal laws about cannabis.

He is scheduled to go to trial this year and next defending 2Wire Inc. in a pair of lawsuits brought by TQ Delta LLC alleging infringement of multiple patents on DSL standards. The judge in one of the cases has divided the patents at issue into six families for separate trials. TQ Delta LLC v. 2Wire Inc., 1:13-cv- 01835 (D. Del, filed Nov. 4, 2013).

The other case, against 2Wire’s parent company CommScope Inc., is set for trial in January. TQ Delta, LLC v. CommScope Holding Company, Inc.2:21- cv-00310 (E.D. Tex., filed Aug. 13, 2021).

Early this month, he reached a settlement in a copyright, trade secrets and breach of contract lawsuit mere days before trial was to start. He represents a national nursing education company against a nurse who started a competing business using some of his client’s materials, he said. Assessment Technologies Institute LLC v. Parkes, 2:19-cv-2514 (D. Kan., filed Aug. 27, 2019).

And in February, he and his team brought an end to the tangled, high-stakes litigation centered on client Anthony Levandowski, the now infamous engineer who was convicted of stealing Google’s trade secrets about self-driving cars when he quit to launch a competitor. His company was acquired by Uber in 2016.

Google sued Levandowski and won a $179 million judgment in arbitration. Levandowski looked to Uber to pay the award, but Uber refused to honor its previous indemnity agreement, according to Schuman. So Levandowski filed for bankruptcy and sued Uber. In re Levandowski, 20-30242 (Bankr. N.D. Cal., filed March 4, 2020).

Schuman said he is happy with the settlement, which requires his client to pay Google just $30 million, much less than the signing bonus he’d received from Uber.

“It was a fascinating case,” Schuman said. “I don’t know that another case like that will come along in my career.”

Some of his cannabis cases are interesting, too. Schuman launched Goodman’s cannabis practice along with a Boston partner in 2016, soon after he joined the firm. “We are now one of the two top-ranked cannabis practices in the country,” he said. “I’m very proud of that because it was something I worked very hard at building.”

They handle transactions and consumer class actions about THC content, among other matters.

He also is litigating a pair of IP matters that raise unique issues. Both involve non-cannabis businesses challenging his clients over trademarks. A federal judge in one has already held that Schuman’s client can’t claim prior use of the name “Kiva” because its business is illegal. Kiva Health Brands v. Kiva Brands Inc., 3:19-cv-03459 (N.D. Cal. June 19, 2019).

“These are difficult, cutting-edge cases that our clients have entrusted us with,” Schuman said. “We’re basically making law as we go along.”

– Don DeBenedictis