Untitled case

Parties and commercial setting. The docket is Automotive Technologies International, Inc. v. General Motors Corp., No. 2:08-cv-00057 (E.D. Tex.), filed February 11, 2008 and listed as closed (Ex Parte docket record). ATI, the plaintiff, is an automotive occupant-safety technology and patent-licensing company associated with inventor David S. Breed; it develops and licenses sensing and airbag technology rather than manufacturing vehicles, and the docket aggregator classifies it as an “Operating Company” rather than a university or a classic litigation-only entity. GM, the defendant, is the automaker. The case was one of ATI’s 2008 assertions against automakers and suppliers in the occupant-detection space. The earlier report could not verify the caption; the aggregator now supplies it, but because that source is not PACER and no docket sheet was retrieved, the assigned judge and counsel remain unverified.

Accused technology and patent. ATI’s theory, as reported in contemporaneous coverage of the campaign, was that GM vehicles equipped with Delphi’s Passive Occupant Detection System (“PODS”) infringed ATI’s occupant-safety patents. Law.com reported that ATI sued GM, Ford, and Mercedes-Benz USA in February 2008 over PODS and seven ATI patents, but placed that filing in N.D. Tex.; this docket is in E.D. Tex., so the PODS identification is strong campaign context rather than a docket-confirmed fact (Law.com). The patent tied to this docket by the case metadata is U.S. 6,757,602, “System for determining the occupancy state of a seat in a vehicle and controlling a component based thereon,” issued June 29, 2004, with a 1997 priority date. Claim 1 is a sensor-data method: classify the seat occupant—empty seat,

I'll research this docket and its related proceedings.

Key Legal Developments & Disposition — Automotive Technologies Int'l, Inc. v. General Motors Corp., No. 2:08-cv-00057 (E.D. Tex.)

Research caveat up front. I again could not pull the PACER docket sheet for 2:08-cv-00057 itself (my search budget was cut off mid-investigation). The docket-level record below is therefore reconstructed from (a) the case-index entry confirming the caption/filing date/closed status, and (b) the much better-documented companion and successor proceedings on the same patent family — principally the D. Del. action that ran in parallel and the E.D. Mich. ATI cases. Where a step is inferred from a companion docket rather than read off the 2:08-cv-00057 docket, I say so explicitly. I have not fabricated any docket entry, ruling, or date.

Verified case anchors (building on the prior sections, not repeating them)

That Volvo association is the most useful new fact: it indicates the 2008 Marshall filing was not a single-defendant GM case but part of ATI's multi-defendant 2008 automaker wave in the 2:08-cv-0005x block of the Marshall Division.

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Chronology

Phase 1 — The '602 patent's first assertion is in Delaware, not Texas (2006–2007)

1. 2006-03-17 — ATI sues in D. Del. Automotive Technologies Int'l, Inc. v. American Honda Motor Co., Elesys North America, Inc. and General Motors Corp., No. 1:06-cv-00187-GMS (D. Del.). The AO-120 (filed 2006-03-20, Dkt. 3) lists eleven patents including "6,757,602 B2 — 6/29/04." This is the first verified assertion of the '602 patent.
2. 2006-06-12 — Defendants answer and counterclaim. GM, Honda and Elesys filed a joint "Answer to Complaint with Jury Demand, Counterclaim, Affirmative Defenses, And Counterclaims" (Dkt. 22) — i.e., invalidity and non-infringement counterclaims were in play from the outset. ATI answered the counterclaims in 2006.
3. 2006 — Defendants move to transfer to E.D. Mich. (Dkt. 17, with opening/answering/reply briefs). The case remained in Delaware, so the motion did not end the Delaware forum.
4. 2007-08-21 — Case stayed pending USPTO reexamination. The Rule 26(f)/status report (Dkt. 79) recites that "the Court has stayed these two cases pending reexaminations filed at the USPTO on a number of the patents-in-suit," and that five reexaminations remained pending — for the '387, '080, '414, '602 and '248 patents. Critically: "ATI has filed responses to Office Actions in the reexamination proceedings of the '602 and '080 patents." So the '602 patent was in ex parte reexamination by 2007, requested by the Honda-side defendants.

Strategic significance: the patent-in-suit in 2:08-cv-00057 was already under PTO validity attack and already subject to a district-court stay when ATI filed in Marshall. That is the single most important frame for everything that follows.

Phase 2 — ATI opens the Marshall front (2008)

1. 2008-02-11 — Complaint filed in E.D. Tex., No. 2:08-cv-00057 (ATI v. GM; Volvo appears on the same docket). Verified filing; contents unverified. Based on the campaign pattern, the complaint likely asserted the '602 together with other ATI occupant-sensing patents, but I have not confirmed which patents were formally pleaded in this docket — treat that as an open item, not a finding. The case metadata lists the '602, which is consistent with the D. Del. AO-120.
2. 2008-03-11 — Companion E.D. Mich. case. ATI files Automotive Technologies Int'l, Inc. v. Delphi Corp., No. 2:08-cv-11048 (E.D. Mich.) (RPX litigation record; four patents-in-suit, 13 defendants, closed 2011-03-09, last docket entry 2012-06-08). The parallel Michigan track matters because ATI's earlier Michigan cases (e.g., ATI v. BMW, No. 01-cv-71700) had gone badly for ATI — the Federal Circuit affirmed invalidity of the '253 patent for lack of enablement — and defendants had sought transfer there.
3. 2008-11 — ATI moves to lift the Delaware stay (Dkt. 82, "MOTION to Lift Stay"); defendants file a joint answering brief in opposition (Dkt. 83+). This is the point at which ATI began pressing to get its '602-family claims moving while reexam certificates were still outstanding.

Phase 3 — Claim narrowing, GM's bankruptcy, and the stay holding (2009)

1. 2009-04-14 — ATI drops a patent and abandons an attempt to add one. Law360 (Tina Peng), "Claims Pared In Patent Suit V. GM, Ford, Others": ATI "dropped one of its four patent infringement claims and opted not to add another in a suit against several major automakers." This is the best evidence of substantive claim-by-claim attrition in the 2008 automaker wave. Flag: the Law360 headline names GM and Ford together, which fits the 2:08-cv-0005x Marshall block; I could not open the article to confirm it is 2:08-cv-00057 rather than a sibling docket.
2. 2009-06-01 — GM's bankruptcy intervenes. A "NOTICE of Bankruptcy (General Motors Corporation)" was filed on the Delaware docket by the GM/Honda/Elesys side (visible in the docket index for 1:06-cv-00187). GM's Chapter 11 filing implicated the automatic stay and complicated any judgment-attainment strategy against GM in every pending ATI case, including this one.
3. 2009-09-17 — Stay upheld. Law360 (Allison Grande),

I'll research this case and its counsel.

Let me search more specifically for the patent and case.

Counsel of Record — Research Status: Not Verified

I was unable to verify the identity of plaintiff's counsel in 2:08-cv-00057 (E.D. Tex.). I want to be explicit about that up front rather than fill the gap with plausible-sounding names, per the operating rules.

What I searched and what I found

None of these searches produced a docket sheet, a complaint signature block, a notice of appearance, or a firm press release tying named counsel to this case number. Accordingly, I cannot list a lead counsel, local counsel, of-counsel, or in-house attorney for the plaintiff without fabricating — which I will not do.

What can be said about the patent and a likely related track (flagged as inference, not verified)

• U.S. Patent No. 6,757,602 issued June 29, 2004 (confirmed via patent-family annexes in WO publications that list "US 6757602 B2," e.g., WO2011087355A3 and WO2014027131A1). I could not retrieve the patent's title, assignee, or inventors within the search budget.
• The '602 patent is best known from the later Oasis Research litigation — Oasis Research LLC v. Adrive, LLC et al., No. 4:10-cv-00477 (E.D. Tex.), which consolidated a large multi-defendant online-backup/remote-storage campaign asserting a family that includes the '602 patent. This is an inference I was not able to confirm against a source in this session, and it does not match the 2008 case number in the metadata.
• ⚠️ Flagged discrepancy: The metadata gives a Marshall Division 2008 filing (2:08-cv-00057). The documented, widely-reported assertions of the '602 patent that I am aware of postdate that by roughly two years. Either (a) the 2008 case is a distinct, earlier assertion that is poorly indexed, or (b) the "2:08-cv-00057" reference in the source record is itself an error/duplicate. This should be resolved against the docket before any counsel name is attributed.

How to get the authoritative answer (exact steps)

Counsel of record will appear in these specific documents, which are the correct sources:

1. PACER / CourtListener RECAP docket for E.D. Tex. 2:08-cv-00057 — pull Dkt. 1 (Complaint) and read the signature block; that identifies filing counsel and firm. On CourtListener, search the docket number directly under the E.D. Tex. district court.
2. Notices of Appearance (Dkt. 2–15 range) — in 2008 EDTX practice, plaintiff's counsel typically filed a Notice of Appearance and often associated local counsel for the Marshall Division, whose names appear there and not necessarily in the complaint.
3. The AO-120 "Report on the Filing of an Action Regarding a Patent" — confirms the patent number, plaintiff, and defendant on the docket cover, which would verify whether the '602 patent was in fact asserted here.
4. If the case was a consolidated member of a multi-defendant campaign, check the lead-case docket (the lowest-numbered member) for the master counsel list.

Bottom line

• Plaintiff's counsel of record: NOT IDENTIFIED. Searches against PACER-adjacent sources, EDTX filings, patent-litigation databases, and firm materials did not surface this docket.
• No attorneys are named here because naming any would be unsupported. If you can provide the party names or a PACER docket link for 2:08-cv-00057, I can pull the complaint signature block and notices of appearance and give you a fully sourced counsel table (name, role, firm, office, and relevant patent-litigation history).
• Caveat on this answer: I reached my research-step limit mid-investigation, so this reflects an incomplete search rather than a confirmed negative. The absence of results should be read as "not yet located," not as "no counsel exist."

Sources consulted (all returned negative for this docket): Justia federal district court opinions; CourtListener RECAP; Google Patents/patentimages family annexes (WO2011087355A3, WO2014027131A1); IPO/KIPO patent-litigation reports; Law360/Mealey's-indexed items. None confirmed the parties or counsel in 2:08-cv-00057.

I'll research this case and the patent at issue to identify defense counsel.

Let me verify the patent and the specific case details.

I ran into a research ceiling before I could pull the docket sheet itself, so I need to be straight with you about what is and isn't verified.

Bottom line: defense counsel not verified

I was not able to confirm the counsel of record for the defendant in E.D. Tex. No. 2:08-cv-00057 from the sources available to me. No PACER/docket-sheet text, appearance entry, or firm press release identifying GM's counsel in this docket surfaced in my searches. I am therefore not going to name any attorney for the defense — doing so would be fabrication.

What I did verify about the case (and a flag on the metadata)

Case identity — verified. No. 2:08-cv-00057 in the E.D. Tex. is Automotive Technologies International, Inc. v. General Motors Corp., cause of action "Patent Infringement," filed 02/11/2008, status Closed (source: ai-lab.exparte.com case record, dct/txed/2:08-cv-00057/automotive-tech-intl-inc-v-general-motors-corp). This is consistent with — and now corroborates — the "further matter" line in the prior section's summary, which had listed this docket without verifying parties or outcome.

Patent — verified. U.S. 6,757,602 B2 is titled "System for determining the occupancy state of a seat in a vehicle and controlling a component based thereon," issued June 29, 2004, assigned to Automotive Technologies International, Inc. (David S. Breed et al.). This matches the patent in the case metadata.

Context on the plaintiff side (relevant, but not the defendant). ATI is a prolific automotive-patent enforcer (Breed inventions: occupant sensing, airbags, seat-weight/occupancy detection). Its 2008 campaign included a wave of E.D. Tex. complaints — the 2:08-cv-0005x series — against automakers/suppliers. An ATI complaint in that wave (RPX litigation document 2376956) asserts multiple ATI patents (e.g., the '945, '100 '824, '516, and '080 patents) against GM and other defendants, and is consistent with this docket's subject matter. Caveat: that document is not confirmed to be the complaint in this docket, and I could not confirm which patents were formally asserted against GM here.

What is likely but unverified

• ATI's side has historically been handled by Niro, Scavone, Haller & Niro LLP (Chicago) — the firm associated with ATI's enforcement program. I flag this only as campaign context; I did not verify appearances in this docket.
• GM's side: I found no reliable source naming GM's outside or in-house counsel here. GM typically used large national firms and its in-house IP group for the ATI cases, but I cannot tie any specific attorney or firm to this docket without the docket sheet.

How to close the gap (specific, actionable)

1. PACER docket sheet for 2:08-cv-00057 (E.D. Tex.) — look for the Docket Entry titled "Notice of Attorney Appearance" / "Notice of Appearance" and the signature blocks on the Answer, Rule 26(f) report, and any dispositive-motion papers. This is the authoritative source.
2. RECAP/CourtListener — the docket may be mirrored at courtlistener.com under gov.uscourts.txed for this case; free and often carries PDFs of appearances and the Answer.
3. Bloomberg Law / Lex Machina docket summaries — both index "Attorneys" per case for E.D. Tex. dockets and will list lead/local counsel with firm and address.
4. ATI v. GM related filings in the D. Del. and E.D. Mich. ATI cases (e.g., ATI v. American Honda, No. 06-187-GMS; ATI v. Delphi) sometimes list the same defense teams and can corroborate.

If you can supply the PACER docket sheet or the Answer's signature block, I can name the defense attorneys, their roles, firms, and office locations with confidence. Until then, the honest answer on defendant's counsel is: unverified — no appearance data located.