The Prior Art

Patent Litigation Weekly: DataTreasury Wins First Patent Trial, Against U.S. Bank

While the patent world awaits a Bilski ruling that could have a dramatic impact on business-method patents, an East Texas trial victory in a case involving, yup, business-method patents adds fuel into a what could become a billion-dollar licensing campaign for a holding company.

On March 26, an East Texas jury ordered U.S. Bancorp to pay $27 million for infringing check-imaging patents held by DataTreasury. That sum—which could be tripled since the infringement was found to have been willfull—will be added to the more than $350 million that DataTreasury has already collected from some 30 other banks and check-processing companies that have agreed to license the small company's patents. (Verdict Form, PDF).

The verdict is a first for DataTreasury, which has two additional trials scheduled against a total of eight banks. In those cases, the holding company is demanding a combined $1.39 billion in damages—more than half of it from Bank of America for processing 64 billion checks in a manner that DataTreasury says infringes its patents.  (See p. 5 of Scheduling Order, PDF).

Well, you can always get work in patent litigation...

Giant multi-defendant patent lawsuits, especially ones where plaintiffs claim to have patent rights over an industry standard, can really be a lawyer-full-employment act. There are limits to how much defendants can cooperate, especially when they're tough competitors outside the courtroom.

DataTreasury's patent war against the banking industry is already keeping dozens of lawyers busy, not to mention many lobbyists and politicians. Now the case has brought on board a prominent, but formerly unemployable, attorney—Alberto Gonzales. Story on Bloomberg via TPM.