Juxtacomm-Texas Software, LLC v. Axway, Inc., et al., 6:10cv11
Judge: Leonard Davis
Holding: Motion for Summary Judgment of Invalidity GRANTED
A recent trend in the Eastern District which began with Markman rulings has started to expand. For example, recent Markman rulings from judges Davis, Love, Gilstrap and Payne have taken the form of expedited preliminary opinions (which range from a couple of days to a couple of weeks after the hearing) which provide the constructions themselves but without analysis or reasoning so that the parties can start work on their expert reports. The full opinions with the analysis follow in a matter of weeks (assuming the case hasn't settled in the interim - a not unusual outcome following a Markman ruling). The benefit to this practice is that the parties can stay on a faster schedule for trial since they aren't spending months waiting on a full-blown Markman ruling. The down side would be if the constructions changed in the final opinion, but to my knowledge that hasn't happened yet - if the construction makes it into a "preliminary" ruling it's a solid bet it'll be in the full opinion.
Today Chief Judge Leonard Davis applied the principle to dispositive rulings, issuing an order granting the defendant's motion for summary judgment of invalidity, noting that a memorandum opinion explaining the Court's reasoning "will be provided in the near future." This case was set for pretrial conference on September, with trial to follow in October. Without going into details, the motion, which was heard on April 24 before Judge Davis, appears to have argued that the court's Markman ruling was dispositive, despite the plaintiff's post-Markman arguments to the contrary.
