Thomas John Ward, Jr.

I'll research this attorney's background and practice.

Let me dig deeper into his specific cases, IPR experience, and firm history.

Let me verify a few more specifics — the tracked cases, PTAB work, and recent outcomes.

Thomas John Ward, Jr. — Patent Litigation Practice Summary

Focus and side of the docket. Ward's tracked appearances are 7-for-7 on the plaintiff side, and in every one he is listed as local counsel, Local Counsel, or Of Counsel rather than lead trial counsel. The tracked docket is concentrated in assertion campaigns by non-practicing patent owners — the Innovative Display Technologies LLC suits against T-Mobile, BMW of North America, and Apple, plus Orthosie Systems, LLC v. Mack Trucks, Inc. — i.e., display/backlighting and consumer-electronics subject matter litigated in Texas. Firm-level docket listings (Plainsite) show a similarly shaped broader practice for patent-holding entities including SIPCO, Rembrandt Wireless, Adaptix, Core Wireless, Network-1, Realtime Data, and Acacia-related plaintiffs. His technology coverage skews to electronics, wireless/networking and communications rather than pharmaceuticals or chemistry, despite the chemistry degree attributed to him in some directories (see disambiguation note below).

Firm context. He is a name partner at Ward, Smith & Hill, PLLC in Longview, Texas, which was previously styled Ward & Smith Law Firm; the three firm names in the tracked data reflect that rename rather than separate employers. Benchmark Litigation describes him as the firm's founder. Disambiguation: the retired Eastern District of Texas judge T. John Ward (Baylor J.D. 1967) is a separate attorney who is Of Counsel at the same firm, and several directories (e.g., MoreLaw) erroneously merge the judge's biography and bar-admission data into profiles for "Thomas John Ward, Jr." The subject of this summary is the Texas Tech 1995 graduate.

Notable matters. His most prominent reported work is as East Texas counsel for VirnetX Inc. v. Apple Inc. (E.D. Tex., Judge Robert Schroeder III), alongside lead counsel Caldwell Cassady & Curry: a $625.6 million verdict (Feb. 2016, later set aside as improperly combined with a second case and re-tried), a $302 million verdict (Oct. 2016, enhanced to roughly $439 million), a $502.6 million verdict (Apr. 2018), and a $502.8 million verdict (Oct. 2020). Court minutes and contemporaneous coverage confirm Ward's trial participation, including closing argument and cross-examination of Apple's damages expert in the 2020 trial. His representative-case listing also includes Smartflash LLC v. Apple ($532.9 million, 2015), DataQuill Ltd. v. ZTE ($31.5 million, 2015), Elbit Systems v. Hughes Network Systems ($21.1 million, 2017), Whirlpool Corp. v. TST Water ($7.6 million, 2017), and a defense win for Medallion Foods/Ralcorp against Frito-Lay (2013). Caution: several of these are co-counsel roles reported by the firm and Benchmark Litigation, and the larger awards drew appeals and parallel PTAB validity challenges; I did not verify final dispositions for each within this review. No public outcome was located for Orthosie Systems v. Mack Trucks.

PTAB / IPR, bar and education. He appears in PTAB and USPTO records as counsel of record in AIA proceedings and reexaminations — including IPR2020-00509 and IPR2020-00510 concerning U.S. Pat. 8,023,580 (SIPCO), where filings list him on the patent-owner side — but the public record does not show him as a recurrent lead petitioner's counsel in IPR/PGR, and he is best characterized as a district-court litigator with supporting PTAB involvement. Per his Best Lawyers and Benchmark profiles: B.A., University of Oklahoma (1992, with distinction); J.D., Texas Tech University School of Law (1995, magna cum laude); law clerk to the Hon. Robert M. Parker (Ret.), U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. Admitted in Texas (1995) and Colorado; before the Fifth and Sixth Circuits and the Eastern, Northern, and Western Districts of Texas. His current firm lists him at Ward, Smith & Hill, 1507 Bill Owens Parkway, Longview, Texas.

Sources: Ward, Smith & Hill firm releases and Miller Fair Henry reprints; Benchmark Litigation and Best Lawyers practitioner profiles; Martindale-Hubbell; Law360 attorney profile; Justia/CourtListener dockets in VirnetX v. Apple; USPTO PTAB filings and file histories (IPR2020-00509/-00510; Reexam 90/013,808); Plainsite attorney docket index. Where data conflicted (notably the MoreLaw and Super Lawyers profile merges), the Texas Tech 1995 / Oklahoma 1992 record was treated as controlling.