U.S. District Court, Central District of California (related to the Twitter case; Judge George H. Wu)

I'll research the Central District of California's patent litigation practice before writing.

Let me verify a few more specifics — the district's Patent Program, judges, and current venue ranking.

U.S. District Court for the Central District of California — Patent Litigation Profile

Court overview. The Central District of California (C.D. Cal.) is the nation's largest federal district by population, sitting in the Ninth Circuit with courthouses in Los Angeles (Western Division), Santa Ana (Ronald Reagan Federal Building, Southern Division), and Riverside (Eastern Division). It is a perennial top-five patent venue. Lex Machina's 2023 Patent Litigation Report counted 766 patent cases filed in C.D. Cal. from 2020–2022 — 6.49% of the national total, trailing only the Eastern District of Texas. Its annual patent filings have generally run in the 220–350 range in recent years (298 in 2020, 245 in 2021, 223 in 2022), well below EDTX's volume but comfortably in the top tier alongside D. Del. and N.D. Cal. Lex Machina's 2025 report notes EDTX reclaimed the top spot in 2023–2024; C.D. Cal. remained among the most active districts. (Filing counts vary by dataset and by whether "mass filer" cases are excluded — treat any single figure as approximate.)

Patent docket reputation. C.D. Cal. is not a rocket docket. Docket Navigator's time-to-trial statistics for the district (cases filed January 2022 – August 2025, submitted in a 2025 PTAB proceeding) show a median of roughly 35 months and an average of about 39 months from filing to trial, with a range of 17 to 94 months. That is materially slower than EDTX or W.D. Tex. and comparable to other large urban districts. It is also not commonly described as a plaintiff's venue in the EDTX sense. Historically, C.D. Cal. has been noted for having no district-wide patent local rules, random case assignment, and a large, diverse jury pool — factors cited as making it attractive to filers but also producing procedural uncertainty. Older academic work (Schwartz, studying 2000–2008 claim construction appeals; Kesan, studying 1995–2003 cases) found the district's claim construction rulings were reversed, vacated, or remanded at a higher rate (46.3%) than other major patent districts, and that its rulings were fully affirmed least often among the top ten venues. That data is now dated and should be read as historical context, not current performance. On transfer, C.D. Cal. cases are often difficult to move because most large technology defendants have substantial operations, employees, and customers in the district — though § 1404(a) and TC Heartland-era practice have produced transfers in both directions.

Local rules and procedures. C.D. Cal. has never adopted district-wide patent local rules. Instead, a subset of judges issue individual "Standing Patent Rules" — the best-known example being Judge Andrew J. Guilford's, which closely tracks the Northern District of California's Patent L.R. 2–4 (infringement contentions, invalidity contentions, exchange of disputed terms, limitation to the ten most significant terms, joint claim construction and prehearing statement, and staged Markman briefing). Other judges adopt variants (e.g., Judge Josephine Staton's order adds time to each N.D. Cal.-style deadline), and some judges have no patent-specific rules at all and manage claim construction case-by-case — occasionally resolving it through summary judgment rather than a standalone Markman hearing. Practitioners should therefore consult the individual judge's standing order and the district's judges' procedures page rather than assuming uniformity. A recurring practice point from the tracked BlackBerry litigation: Judge Wu indicated at a status conference that he is disinclined to stay a case pending IPR until the PTAB has issued institution decisions, before granting a renewed stay motion.

Notable tracked cases. The site's single tracked matter, BlackBerry Limited v. Facebook, Inc., WhatsApp Inc., and Instagram, LLC, No. 2:18-cv-01844-GW-KS(x) (C.D. Cal., filed March 6, 2018; terminated Feb. 16, 2021), is representative of the district's handling of large multi-patent campaigns. BlackBerry asserted nine patents covering mobile messaging, notifications, and cryptography. Judge Wu presided over consolidated proceedings that included a parallel BlackBerry action against Snap Inc. (No. 2:18-cv-02693-GW) and, per the site's own description, the related Twitter action — a set of BlackBerry suits against social-media platforms all assigned to Judge Wu. The court resolved much of the case on the papers: September 2019 and July 2020 summary judgment rulings addressed § 101 invalidity and non-infringement across several patents; a Rule 54(b) final judgment entered November 26, 2019 held the '351 and '929 patents invalid; and multiple asserted claims went to PTAB inter partes review. After a confidential settlement, Judge Wu vacated his '236 patent summary judgment ruling in February 2021 to remove any preclusive effect and facilitate the deal. Final disposition of the Facebook action is not confirmed in the site's structured data beyond the February 2021 termination; the case did not go to trial. Broader high-profile C.D. Cal. patent matters in recent years include Masimo Corp. v. Apple Inc. (Judge Selna, tried to a jury in 2023) and Universal Electronics v. Roku (Judge Selna).

Judges. The district concentrates patent work through a Patent Program — originally part of the congressionally funded Patent Pilot Program launched in 2011, in which the district's participating judges included Birotte, Guilford, Kronstadt, Otero, Selna, and Wu. The program's judges are experienced with patent cases and, per a 2023 Federal Bar Association / Alston & Bird panel, include District Judges John Holcomb, John Kronstadt, James V. Selna, and George H. Wu, plus Magistrate Judge Michael Wilner. Lex Machina data for 2020–2022 shows the heaviest individual patent caseloads in the district going to Kronstadt (115), Selna (101), Wu (101), and André Birotte Jr. (86). Their case-management styles differ in ways litigants should plan around: Selna and Holcomb typically set a trial date at the outset (Holcomb roughly 18 months from the scheduling conference), with Selna strict about continuances; Kronstadt tends to set trial after discovery closes and a dispositive motion is under submission; and Wu sets trial at the Markman hearing and generally defers to the parties' proposed schedule, with more flexibility on continuances. Judge Wu is the assigned judge in the tracked BlackBerry matter.

Sourcing note. Court composition and division details come from the district's own website; filing and judge-level counts from Lex Machina's published patent litigation reports; time-to-trial figures from Docket Navigator statistics reproduced in PTAB filings; local-rules practice from individual standing orders (e.g., Judge Guilford's Standing Patent Rules) and law review commentary; judge-specific management practices from the 2023 FBA panel summary. Reversal-rate figures are drawn from pre-2010 academic studies and should not be treated as current. No claim here characterizes any individual judge as plaintiff- or defendant-friendly, as no current published Lex Machina or Unified Patents analysis supports such a characterization for this district's bench.