Untitled case

Unified Patents has initiated an Inter Partes Review (IPR2026-00248) before the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) to challenge the validity of U.S. Patent No. 10,664,141. The petitioner, Unified Patents, is a member-based organization dedicated to deterring patent assertions by Non-Practicing Entities (NPEs) by challenging the validity of such patents through post-grant proceedings like IPRs. The patent owner is Cogmedia LLC, which has asserted patent 10664141, among others, in district court litigation against Meta Platforms, Inc.. Cogmedia LLC describes itself as a company involved in digital design, and its assertion of patents against a large technology company like Meta suggests its role as an NPE in this context.

The patent at issue, U.S. Patent No. 10,664,141, titled "Methods and Apparatus for Managing and Exchanging Information Using Information Objects," was granted on May 26, 2020. It broadly covers computer-implemented methods related to core functionalities of social media platforms, such as visualizing media posts from various external sources in a uniform card format, and user interaction features like liking, sharing, and commenting on these posts. This patent is being asserted against Meta's social media platforms, including Facebook.com and its associated mobile applications.

The IPR, filed on March 18, 2026, is currently pending before the PTAB. The PTAB, an administrative tribunal within the USPTO, serves as a specialized venue for challenging patent validity, offering a potentially more efficient and cost-effective alternative to district court litigation for defendants facing infringement claims. Unified Patents frequently leverages IPRs to invalidate patents held by NPEs, aiming to mitigate the risk of patent litigation for its members. This case is notable as it underscores Unified Patents' ongoing strategy to combat NPE assertions and the broader industry effort to address the challenges posed by patents covering fundamental software functionalities widely used across technology platforms. The related district court case, Cogmedia LLC v. Meta Platforms, Inc. (1:25-cv-12127) in the District of Massachusetts, where Meta's motion to transfer venue was denied in January 2026, highlights the significance and active nature of the underlying patent dispute.

I'll research the litigation history for Cogmedia LLC v. Meta Platforms, Inc. and the parallel PTAB proceedings.

I have important findings — including a significant discrepancy with the case metadata. Let me dig deeper into the docket, the motion to dismiss ruling, the IPR institution decisions, and the current posture.

Key Legal Developments & Outcome — Cogmedia LLC v. Meta Platforms, Inc. (D. Mass. 1:25-cv-12127) and Parallel PTAB Proceedings

⚠️ Threshold flag: metadata contradicts the sourced record on the IPR petitioner

Before the chronology, one contradiction must be surfaced because it infects the whole PTAB analysis:

• Case metadata / prior summary say: IPR2026-00248 was filed by Unified Patents as petitioner against Cogmedia.
• Every primary and secondary source I retrieved says otherwise: IPR2026-00248 is captioned Meta Platforms, Inc. v. Cogmedia LLC, and the petition was filed by Meta (through Paul Hastings LLP — lead counsel Lisa K. Nguyen, Reg. No. 58,018; backup David M. Tennant, Reg. No. 48,362, plus Diane Ghrist and Michelle H. Zhang). The Board's own "Notice filing date accorded" (Paper 3, 2026-03-19) lists Petitioner's counsel as "Lisa Nguyen / David Tennant, PAUL HASTINGS LLP." (PTAB docket, IPR2026-00248.)

Per your operating rules I treat the metadata as authoritative for the case number/patents, but I must explicitly flag that the petitioner identity in the metadata appears incorrect: Meta, not Unified Patents, is the petitioner, and the same Paul Hastings team defending Meta in the district court (Nguyen, Zhang) is prosecuting the IPRs. The prior "Plaintiff representatives" section listing Unified Patents in-house counsel (Stroud, Rossen, Seastrunk, Callaghan, Marks, Raj) appears to be a misattribution for this particular matter. I did not find any Unified Patents filing tied to IPR2026-00248.

A second correction: the prior summary frames the '141 patent as the sole patent at issue. In the litigation, Cogmedia asserts three patents (all naming Dr. Paul Erich Keel), and Meta has challenged two of them at the PTAB:

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1. Filing & initial pleadings (2025)

• 2025-07-30 — Cogmedia LLC (Cambridge, MA; sole managing member Dr. Paul Keel) filed its Complaint for Patent Infringement against Meta Platforms, Inc. in the District of Massachusetts (Dkt. 1). Judge Brian E. Murphy assigned (Dkt. 9); Magistrate Judge Jessica D. Hedges noted. Local counsel Kerry L. Timbers / Kevin R. Mosier appeared for Cogmedia (Dkt. 5), with pro hac vice motions for Michael T. Cooke, Jonathan T. Suder, and Dave R. Gunter (Friedman, Suder & Cooke, Fort Worth, TX) (Dkts. 6–8).
• 2025-07-30/31 — Summons issued (Dkt. 10); Cogmedia's PHV motions granted (Dkts. 11–13), later adding Alexander N. Yow (Dkt. 16).
• 2025-07-31 — Meta served; answer due 2025-08-21 (Summons Returned Executed, Dkt. 20). (One aggregator snippet showed a truncated "served on 7/3," but the full docket entry reads 7/31/2025.)
• 2025-08-15 — Meta appeared through Matthias A. Kamber (Paul Hastings, Boston) (Dkt. 21) and obtained an assented extension of time to respond (Dkt. 22), granted 2025-08-19 (Dkt. 23), moving the response deadline to 2025-10-06.

(Source: Justia docket, D. Mass. 1:25-cv-12127 — https://dockets.justia.com/docket/massachusetts/madce/1:2025cv12127/[287435](/patent/287435). Note: the Justia docket I retrieved appears current only through Oct. 2025, so later events below are sourced from PTAB exhibits and law-firm case notes rather than the docket itself.)

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2. Pre-trial motions of substance

(a) Motion to dismiss — DENIED

• 2025-10-06 — Meta filed a Motion to Dismiss for Failure to State a Claim with a request for oral hearing (Dkt. 24) and supporting memorandum (Dkt. 25); it simultaneously filed its corporate disclosure statement (Dkt. 26) and PHV motions for Lisa K. Nguyen, Eric Lancaster, Joshua Yin, and Michelle Zhang (Dkts. 27–30), all granted 2025-10-07 (Dkts. 31–33).
• The motion was denied. I could not source the precise ruling date from the docket; it falls between Oct. 2025 and Jan. 2026. Its existence and denial are confirmed by Patent Owner Exhibit 2014 ("Order Denying Petitioner's Motion to Dismiss") filed in IPR2026-00249, and by the Lando & Anastasi note that Judge Murphy's familiarity with the case (having adjudicated the motion to dismiss) counseled against transfer.

(b) Motion to transfer venue (§ 1404(a)) — DENIED (January 2026)

• Meta moved to transfer to the Northern District of California, not disputing that venue in Massachusetts was proper.
• In January 2026, Judge Murphy denied transfer, applying the six Avci v. Brennan factors and holding that "Meta's arguments in favor of transfer are insufficient to outweigh the substantial weight to which Cogmedia's choice of forum is entitled." Key reasoning: plaintiff's choice of forum entitled to "considerable weight" (Cogmedia resides and developed the technology in MA); transfer would merely shift inconvenience; employee-witness inconvenience gets less weight and documents move electronically; California had only a slight interest advantage; and judicial economy slightly favored Cogmedia because the court was already familiar with the case from the motion to dismiss.
• Reported: Finnegan, D. Mass. Patent Litigation Update: January 2026 (2026-02-23) — https://www.finnegan.com/en/insights/articles/d-mass-patent-litigation-update-january-2026.html; Lando & Anastasi (2026-02-20) — https://www.lalaw.com/d-mass-ip-litigation/article/cogmedia-llc-v-meta-platforms-inc-d-b-a-facebook-inc-d-mass-25-cv-12127/.

(c) Motion to stay pending IPR

• No motion to stay was found in any source. Notably, Meta pursued the IPRs without (on the record I retrieved) seeking a district-court stay — a point Cogmedia leveraged at the PTAB (see §5).

(d) Summary judgment

• None. The case had not reached dispositive-motion practice as of the last available records.

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3. Scheduling & claim construction (Markman)

• 2025-12-15 — Scheduling conference held (reflected in Patent Owner Exhibit 2013, "District Court's Notes from Scheduling Conference 12.15.2025," filed in IPR2026-00249).
• A Scheduling Order issued (Patent Owner Exhibit 2012).
• By spring 2026 the case had reached the claim-construction track. IPR2026-00249's Patent Owner exhibits confirm:
  • Patent Owner's Preliminary Infringement Contentions (Ex. 2015),
  • Meta's Non-Infringement and Invalidity Contentions and non-infringement charts (Exs. 2016–2017),
  • Meta's discovery requests (Ex. 2018), and
  • a Joint Claim Construction Statement (Ex. 2019).
• No Markman ruling/order was found. As of the last available records, claim construction had been briefed/jointly framed but not decided. The central disputes flagged in the complaint mapping are likely to drive Markman: whether Facebook's "Like" function meets the claimed "vote function," and whether a user's Wall/Timeline is a "collection of cards."

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4. Discovery milestones

• Fact discovery was underway by Q1 2026 (infringement/non-infringement contentions exchanged; Meta's written discovery served — IPR2026-00249 Exs. 2015–2018).
• No discovery sanctions, protective-order disputes, or dispositive discovery orders were found.
• No trial, verdict, JMOL, new-trial, or fee motions exist — the case has not been tried.

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5. Parallel PTAB proceedings and their effect on the litigation

IPR2026-00248 — Meta Platforms, Inc. v. Cogmedia LLC (U.S. Pat. 10,664,141) — PENDING

• Filed 2026-03-18; Board "Notice filing date accorded" on 2026-03-19 (Paper 3).
• Petitioner's exhibits include the '141 patent (Ex. 1001), its file history (Ex. 1002), and the Declaration of Dr. Andrew Cockburn (Ex. 1003), over a prior-art set including McQueen (7,310,612), Forsyth (7,047,030), do Rosario Botelho (2002/0069105), Boresjo (2003/0189592), Jellinek (7,293,074), Vander Veen (2004/0136510), Morehead (2002/0091775), Csaszar (2003/0233422), Briggs (7,080,139), Knapp (6,769,010), Kurita (2003/0103603), Ludwig (5,854,893), and others.
• Patent Owner (Cogmedia) filed its Power of Attorney, Mandatory Notice, and Initial Exhibit List on 2026-04-06; lead counsel Alexander N. Yow (Reg. No. 82,236), backup Dave R. Gunter (pro hac vice), both of Friedman, Suder & Cooke — the same firm representing Cogmedia in D. Mass.
• Status: pending; a § 315(b) one-year institution decision window (six months from the 3/18/2026 filing) points to an institution decision around September 2026 — i.e., imminent as of today (2026-09-26). I found no institution decision for -248 in the sources retrieved.
• Sources: PTAB docket — https://gaeflexstaging-dot-docketupdate.appspot.com/cases/PTAB/IPR2026-00248/Meta_Platforms_Inc._v._COGMEDIA_LLC/ ; http://www.docketalarm.com/cases/PTAB/IPR2026-00248/.

IPR2026-00249 — Meta Platforms, Inc. v. Cogmedia LLC (U.S. Pat. 11,036,371) — INSTITUTION DENIED

• Filed 2026-03-18, challenging claims 1–29 of the '371 patent on § 103 grounds (Grounds built on McQueen in view of Forsyth, adding Csaszar (claim-capture button), Briggs (sharing/IM), and Knapp (copying cards)), again with the Cockburn declaration.
• Patent Owner filed a Discretionary Denial Brief on 2026-05-15 (with Exs. 2002–2019), invoking the 2025-07-31 PTAB Memorandum and the 2025-03-26 Interim Processes for PTAB Workload Management, and pointing to the advanced parallel D. Mass. case (transfer denial, MTD denial, scheduling order, infringement/validity contentions, joint claim construction statement) — a classic Fintiv-style argument that the Board should discretionarily deny.
• Outcome: institution DENIED on 2026-08-25 (per an aggregator case card listing "Institution 08/25/26 — Status: Institution Denied"). Caution: this outcome comes from a docket aggregator, not a Board opinion PDF I could retrieve; treat the 2026-08-25 date/outcome as reported-but-not-primary-sourced.
• Sources: https://sandbox.docketalarm.com/cases/PTAB/IPR2026-00249/ ; https://ai-lab.exparte.com/case/ptab/IPR2026-00249/meta-platforms-inc-v-cogmedia-llc.

Effect on the litigation

• The denial of IPR2026-00249 removes PTAB risk to the '371 patent (the lead asserted patent in the complaint) and means the district court is now the primary forum for that patent's validity — consistent with the absence (on the record found) of any stay request.
• IPR2026-00248 ('141) remains the sole live validity challenge that could shift leverage; if instituted, expect renewed consideration of a stay or coordination between the Board and Judge Murphy. Its near-term institution decision is the key event to watch.

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6. Final disposition / present posture

• No final judgment, settlement, consent judgment, or appeal. The litigation is active in D. Mass. before Judge Murphy.
• Present posture (as of last available records): pleadings closed (MTD denied), venue fixed in Massachusetts (transfer denied), case in fact discovery and claim-construction briefing (Joint Claim Construction Statement filed; no Markman ruling), no trial date confirmed in the sources retrieved.
• PTAB posture: IPR2026-00248 ('141) pending (institution decision due ~Sept 2026); IPR2026-00249 ('371) institution denied (reported 2026-08-25).
• A third asserted patent, U.S. 9,817,562, appears to have no parallel IPR (it appears in the -249 record only as Patent Owner Exhibit 2002 — likely as the parent/related patent).

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Open items / low-confidence points

1. IPR petitioner identity — metadata says Unified Patents; the record says Meta. I treat this as a metadata error and recommend correcting the case summary.
2. Exact date of the MTD denial order — not pinned down; bracketed between 2025-10 and 2026-01 (evidenced by Ex. 2014 but no docket line retrieved).
3. IPR2026-00249's 2026-08-25 institution denial — reported by an aggregator only; the Board's written decision was not retrieved.
4. Any stay motion, Markman order, or trial schedule — none found; the Justia docket I retrieved was current only through Oct. 2025, so a fresher PACER pull is advisable.

In Inter Partes Review (IPR) proceedings, the petitioner, Unified Patents, typically utilizes its in-house legal team for challenging patents before the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB). Unified Patents is structured as a deterrence entity, not a law firm, and employs its own patent attorneys to manage post-grant proceedings.

While specific counsel for IPR2026-00248 are not yet explicitly detailed in publicly available direct docket searches for this case, the following in-house attorneys at Unified Patents are known to actively handle and litigate post-grant proceedings before the PTAB:

• Jonathan Stroud

  • Role: Chief IP Counsel
  • Firm and office location: Unified Patents, typically operating from their Washington, D.C. area offices, though specific office locations for individual attorneys are not always detailed.
  • Relevant patent litigation experience: Jonathan Stroud leads Unified Patents' legal strategy and frequently participates in discussions and webinars concerning IPRs and patent quality. He has discussed reform proposals for improving the quality of issued U.S. patents.

• Jordan Rossen

  • Role: Senior Patent Counsel
  • Firm and office location: Unified Patents, Washington, D.C.
  • Relevant patent litigation experience: Jordan prepares and litigates post-grant proceedings before the PTAB for Unified Patents. Prior to joining Unified, he practiced in intellectual property litigation departments at Ropes & Gray and Paul Hastings for eleven years.

• David Seastrunk

  • Role: Senior Patent Counsel
  • Firm and office location: Unified Patents, Washington, D.C.
  • Relevant patent litigation experience: David prepares and litigates post-grant proceedings before the PTAB for Unified Patents. He previously practiced at Finnegan, Henderson, Farabow, Garrett & Dunner, LLP, where he was involved in litigating post-grant proceedings, district court cases, and International Trade Commission investigations.

• Michelle Callaghan (also referred to as Michelle Aspen)

  • Role: Senior Patent Counsel
  • Firm and office location: Unified Patents, Washington, D.C.
  • Relevant patent litigation experience: Michelle prepares and litigates post-grant proceedings before the PTAB for Unified Patents. She previously defended clients against patent demands in district courts and challenged patents before the PTAB at Erise IP. Her experience spans a wide range of technologies, including communication networks, video coding, and mobile devices.

• Jessica L.A. Marks

  • Role: Senior Patent Counsel
  • Firm and office location: Unified Patents, Washington, D.C.
  • Relevant patent litigation experience: Jessica is identified as in-house counsel for Unified Patents, handling various USPTO challenges, including ex parte reexamination proceedings as recently as March 2026.

• Vinu Raj

  • Role: In-house Counsel
  • Firm and office location: Unified Patents, Washington, D.C.
  • Relevant patent litigation experience: Vinu Raj is identified as in-house counsel for Unified Patents in recent ex parte reexamination proceedings.

These attorneys collectively form Unified Patents' legal team responsible for its IPR and other post-grant review challenges. Unified Patents actively recruits experienced patent attorneys for these roles, emphasizing experience with PTAB proceedings and ex parte reexaminations.

I'll research the counsel of record. Note upfront: the prior section flagged that the metadata's party alignment (Unified Patents as petitioner/"plaintiff") is contradicted by the record — so I'll pin down counsel on both sides of the PTAB proceeding and the underlying district court case.

Now let me pin down each attorney's firm, office, and experience, plus the local MA counsel for the patent owner.

Counsel of Record — Defendant Side

Framing note (read before the tables)

Two different "defendant" concepts are in play, and the case metadata makes this ambiguous. For completeness I give both sides, but I lead with the one that answers the question as literally posed for the infringement case:

• In the underlying infringement action (Cogmedia LLC v. Meta Platforms, Inc., D. Mass. 1:25-cv-12127), the defendant is Meta Platforms, Inc. Its counsel of record are in Table A.
• In IPR2026-00248 itself, there is technically no "defendant" — the parties are Petitioner and Patent Owner. If one maps the IPR caption onto the metadata's plaintiff/defendant framing (Petitioner = plaintiff), the "defendant" is the patent owner, Cogmedia LLC — Table B. Note the same Meta/Paul Hastings team appears on the petitioner side in the IPR.

⚠️ Consistent with the earlier section's flag: I again found no Unified Patents attorney anywhere in the record for IPR2026-00248. The prior "Plaintiff representatives" list (Stroud, Rossen, Seastrunk, Callaghan, Marks, Raj) should be treated as inapplicable to this matter.

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Table A — Defendant Meta Platforms, Inc.

A-1. PTAB counsel of record (IPR2026-00248, petitioner side)

Source of record: Petitioner's Power of Attorney for IPR of U.S. Pat. 10,664,141, Paper 2, filed 2026-03-18 (signed 2026-02-13 by a Meta Associate General Counsel), and the certificate of service in Patent Owner's papers filed 2026-04-06.

Service address of record for petitioner: PH-META-CogmediaIPR@paulhastings.com.

A-2. District court counsel of record (D. Mass. 1:25-cv-12127, defendant side)

Not found: any separate in-house Meta attorney entering an appearance in the D. Mass. docket, and no D. Mass. filing by any Paul Hastings attorney beyond those listed.

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Table B — Patent Owner / "defendant-side" party Cogmedia LLC

B-1. PTAB counsel of record (IPR2026-00248, respondent/patent-owner side)

Source of record: Patent Owner's Limited Power of Attorney (signed 2026-04-01 by Paul Keel, Managing Member), Patent Owner's Mandatory Notice, and Patent Owner's Initial Exhibit List (all filed 2026-04-06).

B-2. District court counsel of record (plaintiff side, for completeness)

(Per the earlier section, PHV motions were also filed for Cooke, Suder and Gunter — Dkts. 6–8 — and granted Dkts. 11–13, with Yow added at Dkt. 16.)

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Caveats and unverified points

1. Sealed / not-yet-appeared counsel. The PTAB record shows Ghrist and Zhang as "pro hac vice to be filed." As of the 2026-04-06 service lists they were listed but not yet recognized by the Board. If pro hac vice is denied or not pursued, they are not counsel of record at the PTAB, even though they appear on Meta's papers. Conversely, Zhang is admitted in D. Mass.
2. Joshua Yin's firm is the weakest link in Table A-2 — I could not confirm his employer; do not attribute him to Paul Hastings without a PACER pull of his PHV declaration (Dkt. 29, Attach. 1).
3. Timbers/Mosier firm affiliation is also unverified in the retrieved sources; the earlier section cited them only as Boston local counsel.
4. No counsel has "not appeared yet" problem otherwise — both sides entered appearances by August 2025 in D. Mass., and the PTAB designations were in place by the 2026-04-06 filings.
5. Metadata discrepancy (unchanged): the case is captioned Meta Platforms, Inc. v. Cogmedia LLC, IPR2026-00248. Any "Unified Patents" attorney attribution for this docket remains unsupported by the record I can retrieve.

Key sources

• Petitioner's Power of Attorney, Paper 2 (2026-03-18): https://www.docketalarm.com/cases/PTAB/IPR2026-00248/Meta_Platforms_Inc/docs/03-18-2026-Petitioner/Notice__Power_of_Attorney-2-Petitioners_Power_of_Attorney_141.pdf
• Patent Owner's Limited Power of Attorney + Initial Exhibit List (2026-04-06): https://www.docketalarm.com/cases/PTAB/IPR2026-00248/Meta_Platforms_Inc._v._COGMEDIA_LLC/docs/04-06-2026-Patent_Owner/Notice__Power_of_Attorney-4-Notice_Power_of_Attorney.pdf
• PTAB docket: https://gaeflexstaging-dot-docketupdate.appspot.com/cases/PTAB/IPR2026-00248/Meta_Platforms_Inc._v._COGMEDIA_LLC/
• D. Mass. docket (Dkts. 14, 17–19, 21–22, 24–33): https://dockets.justia.com/docket/massachusetts/madce/1:2025cv12127/287435
• Paul Hastings team/profile pages: https://www.paulhastings.com/en-GB/news/paul-hastings-welcomes-premier-tech-focused-ip-litigation-team-in-silicon ; https://chambers.com/lawyer/lisa-nguyen-usa-5:27449380
• Paul Hastings, Daily Journal Top IP Lawyers 2026 (Kamber & Nguyen): https://www.paulhastings.com/accolades/2-partners-named-to-daily-journals-list-of-top-ip-lawyers-2026