Christine M. Morgan

Reed Smith partner Christine M. Morgan specializes her patent litigation practice in the Alice defense in many high-stakes IP cases across the nation. She has seen nearly three decades of success representing a variety of companies in the high technology industry, primarily in cases alleging infringement of computer hardware and software patents.

“I get concerned when I see a patent written very broadly for software functionality because it ties up basic tools of research and impedes progress rather than fosters it. The purpose of the patent system is to foster innovation,” Morgan said. “But when you get a patent on a software function, you really have to describe it in words, and words can be very broad and not necessarily fit the breadth or the scope of the software function that you’re trying to describe. So, I want companies to be able to have the freedom to innovate and not have to face patents that should not have been issued in the first instance.”

Throughout her years in practice, Morgan and her teams have earned a number of wins for clients in a variety of industries, including video game publishing, consumer hardware and electronics, Wi-Fi semiconductors and cloud content management.

“What I like most about it is you get to learn technology for various industries and meet a bunch of smart people,” Morgan said. “And you get to practice in federal court all over the country, which I really enjoy.” Morgan has successfully tried patent cases in a number of the country’s most active patent litigation venues, including the Northern District of California as well as the Eastern Districts of Texas and Virginia.

Though experienced in many areas of the trade, Morgan shines the brightest under Section 101 patent defense. By invalidating patents under the rule, she and her team have successfully represented many clients by eliminating tens of millions of dollars in potential damages. In recent years, she argued as lead trial counsel for MIAX, invalidating two Nasdaq electronic trading patents that were asserted against MIAX in parallel district court litigation.

The Patent Trial and Appeal Board agreed with Morgan that the claims of Nasdaq’s ‘827 and ‘051 patents were invalid under Alice because they merely recite the abstract concept of routing information to a particular destination using generic computer technology. “The decisions are significant because they stake out the metes and bounds of what is not patentable in the fintech space and provide additional clarity about the reach and applications of the holding in Alice.”

Last year, during the pleading stage, Morgan successfully represented Mizuho Orthopedic Systems against Allen Medical Systems Inc. by invalidating two patents related to hospital bed graphical user interfaces that were asserted against her client. Allen Medical Systems Inc., et al. v. Mizuho Orthopedic Systems Inc., 22-cv-02462 (N.D. Cal. July 5, 2022).

“I was pulled in to evaluate the patents and figure out if there were any that were invalid, in my opinion, under Section 101,” Morgan said. “We had a judge who was very up on the law and already had her questions ready to go, which helped with my preparation, approach and ultimate result with the case.”

—Devon Belcher