{"id":494978,"date":"2010-03-31T16:49:56","date_gmt":"2010-03-31T20:49:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.technologytransfertactics.com\/content\/?p=6235"},"modified":"2010-03-31T16:49:56","modified_gmt":"2010-03-31T20:49:56","slug":"attorney-offers-tips-for-controlling-patent-litigation-costs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/494978","title":{"rendered":"Attorney offers tips for controlling patent litigation costs"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A 1955 essay in <em>The Economist<\/em> opened with the famous proclamation, &#8220;Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.&#8221; This observation could refer to &#8220;staffing&#8221; as well as &#8220;time,&#8221; according to Michael N. Rader, a patent attorney and litigator with the Boston-based IP law firm Wolf, Greenfield &amp; Sacks, PC. Keeping your legal team small is the surest way to control the cost of any matter, including a patent case, Rader says. In fact, most patent cases can be handled successfully with a team of two to three lawyers and a paralegal. &#8220;A lean team makes budgeting easier,&#8221; he points out. &#8220;Calculate the billings of the team based on their hourly rates, the expected activity in a particular month or quarter given the case schedule, and the estimated proportion of each attorney&#8217;s time that is available for the case.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Here are Rader&#8217;s additional suggesting for controlling patent litigation costs:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Prepare a detailed quarterly or monthly case budget as soon as the court enters a scheduling order<\/strong>. Revisit and update the case budget every month or two as the case progresses. While the distribution of billing over time may evolve &#8212; for example, savings may be achieved early in the case due to deferrals of work that will occur later &#8212; the overall cost should remain the same absent a game-changing event.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Enter time promptly and check the billing at the middle and end of each month to ensure the case remains within budget<\/strong>. If the team is in danger of exceeding a monthly budget, take corrective steps. &#8220;Litigation billing should not involve surprises,&#8221; Rader says.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Use common sense<\/strong>. Patent litigators should read every patent-related decision of the Federal Circuit within days of its issuance &#8212; and not on the client&#8217;s nickel. Check billings to make sure you&#8217;re not being charged for the basics of keeping current.\u00a0 Preferably, the entire firm or patent group should meet regularly to discuss the more important cases. &#8220;These practices ensure that attorneys are up to speed on the current state of the law and don&#8217;t need to burn a lot of time figuring out which arguments will work in court,&#8221; Rader says.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Develop case themes from the outset and update them regularly to keep the legal team focused<\/strong>. In today&#8217;s economy, litigants don&#8217;t have the luxury of chasing down leads that don&#8217;t relate directly to winning their case.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Prioritize tasks<\/strong>. If the judge disfavors summary judgments, a summary judgment motion isn&#8217;t likely to be worth the effort. Motions to dismiss that will require the plaintiff to re-plead don&#8217;t represent a sensible strategy, either. And rather than demanding that the opposition implement an electronic search protocol that yields a million pages of documents, shoot for a targeted search with a fraction of that yield.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Cooperate with opposing counsel<\/strong>. Civility is more efficient than scorched-earth tactics, Rader says. Avoid motions to compel, which are almost never necessary and disliked by judges.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Abide by deadlines and hold the other party&#8217;s feet to the fire<\/strong>. Time extensions almost always lead to greater overall cost.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Involve a business manager and in-house counsel in supervising the case from the beginning to ensure that your litigation strategy matches your business goals and your legal fees don&#8217;t balloon out of proportion to those goals<\/strong>. Scheduling meetings or calls on a weekly or even daily basis ensures that outside litigators understand their marching orders.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Although settling is the surest way to reduce legal expense, positioning the case for settlement requires clear commitment and planning for trial<\/strong>. An opposing party who sees clearly that your case is being prepared well for trial will be willing to pay more as a defendant in a settlement &#8212; or accept less as plaintiff &#8212; than one who only sees paper being pushed around without a clear trial strategy. &#8220;In short, whether you hope for settlement or trial, you must litigate the case to win,&#8221; Rader says. &#8220;By applying a few basic rules and a healthy dose of common sense, you can win without breaking the bank.&#8221; <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Source: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ipfrontline.com\/depts\/article.asp?id=24155&amp;deptid=2\" >IP Frontline<br \/>\n<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A 1955 essay in The Economist opened with the famous proclamation, &#8220;Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.&#8221; This observation could refer to &#8220;staffing&#8221; as well as &#8220;time,&#8221; according to Michael N. Rader, a patent attorney and litigator with the Boston-based IP law firm Wolf, Greenfield &amp; Sacks, PC. Keeping [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":67,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-494978","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/494978","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/67"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=494978"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/494978\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=494978"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=494978"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=494978"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}