Automotive Technologies International, Inc. v. Delphi Corp. et al.

I'll research this case thoroughly before drafting the overview.

Case Overview and Background

Parties and what they do. Plaintiff Automotive Technologies International, Inc. ("ATI") is a patent-holding and licensing company, not a manufacturer — the

I'll research this case thoroughly across multiple sources. Let me start with several parallel searches.

Let me dig deeper into the docket, Markman order, summary judgment opinion, appeal outcome, and any PTAB proceedings.

I hit the research-tool limit before exhausting every thread, so I'll flag clearly where the record is thin or where I could not confirm a fact. Below is what the available sources support. One metadata caveat up front: although the case metadata lists U.S. Patent No. 6,850,824 ("the '824") as the patent-at-issue, the E.D. Mich. consolidated case reached judgment on four different patents — the '516, '945, '029, and '080. The '824 (issued 2005-02-01) appears in closely related ATI enforcement matters and in the parties' invalidity contentions, but I could not confirm it as one of the four patents that survived to the 2011 summary-judgment ruling in Delphi. I note the discrepancy rather than paper over it.

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Context: the earlier ATI v. BMW/Cleland litigation (the template for this case)

• 2001-05: ATI sued numerous automakers/parts suppliers (BMW, DaimlerChrysler, Ford, GM, Honda, Hyundai, Kia, Mazda, Nissan, Saab, Toyota, VW, plus Delphi, Bosch, Siemens, TRW) in E.D. Mich. on the '253 side-impact-sensor patent. Judge Robert H. Cleland presided.
• 2004-03-31: Cleland issued the claim construction order; 2005 summary judgment of invalidity for lack of enablement (ATI v. BMW of N. Am., Inc., 878 F. Supp. 2d 780 (E.D. Mich. 2005)).
• 2007-09-06: Fed. Cir. affirmed, holding the '253 patent invalid for lack of enablement. ATI v. BMW of N. Am., Inc., 501 F.3d 1274 (Fed. Cir. 2007). (Banner & Witcoff represented Delphi/GM; opinion: https://bannerwitcoff.com/_docs/news_events_archive/news/06-1013.pdf)

This matters strategically: the '080 collateral-estoppel ruling and the defendants' obviousness/anticipation themes in the 2008–2011 case are direct descendants of the '253 enablement loss.

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Chronology — the Delphi action

1. Filing & initial pleadings

• 2008-02: ATI originally sued several Delphi customers (GM, Ford, Mercedes-Benz USA, and others) in the N.D. Tex., asserting seven ATI patents against Delphi's "Passive Occupant Detection System" (PODS). (Law.com/AmLaw Litigation Daily, https://www.law.com/article/almID/1202486605624/)
• 2008-03-11: Delphi filed a declaratory-judgment action in E.D. Mich. (No. 2:08-cv-11048) seeking to invalidate ATI's patents. The Texas customer suit was later consolidated into the Michigan action. (RPX Insight docket, filed 03/11/2008: https://insight.rpxcorp.com/litigation/miedce-[228457](/patent/228457)-automotive-technologies-international-v-delphi)
• The operative pleading named the defendants now in the caption — Delphi Corp., Delphi Automotive Systems LLC, DPH Holdings Corp., the GM entities, Ford, Volvo Cars of North America, Hyundai Motor America, Nissan North America, Mercedes-Benz USA, Fuji Heavy Industries USA, and Motors Liquidation Co. The complaint asserted the '945, '516, and '080 patents against Delphi/DPH Holdings and the OEMs' vehicles (e.g., 2006 Volvo C70, 2007 Hyundai Santa Fe, 2008 Mercedes C-Class, 2007 Subaru Forester, 2005 Cadillac Escalade). (Complaint text via RPX: https://insight.rpxcorp.com/litigation_documents/[1137402](/patent/1137402))
• Answer/counterclaims/re-alignment: Defendants filed counterclaims for invalidity; the parties were realigned by the court (Delphi and the OEMs became defendants/counter-plaintiffs; ATI became plaintiff/counter-defendant). (776 F. Supp. 2d 469, Background §)
• 2008-12-10: Defendants served **Preliminary Invalid

I'll search for press coverage across several angles, then verify the articles listed in the news index.

Found one solid piece. Now let me check other outlets, the 2012 settlement, and verify the listed news-index articles.

Now let me verify the four articles listed in the news index and look for more trade/mainstream coverage.

Press coverage of ATI v. Delphi

Press coverage of this litigation is thin, and almost all of it clusters on a single event: the March 9, 2011 summary-judgment ruling. The one substantive piece I could locate is the ALM/Law.com report headlined "Kenyon & Kenyon Wins Airbag Patent Fight for Delphi" (Law.com / The Am Law Litigation Daily), which framed the outcome as "a resounding victory" for Delphi and its counsel at Kenyon & Kenyon. According to that report, ATI had originally sued several of Delphi's customers — naming General Motors, Ford and Mercedes-Benz USA — in the Northern District of Texas in February 2008, alleging that seven ATI patents were infringed by Delphi's "Passive Occupant Detection System" (PODS); Delphi responded by filing the Michigan declaratory-judgment action, and the Texas case was later consolidated into it. The article describes Judge Cleland's 46-page opinion as granting summary judgment on four patents after "ATI had dropped claims on the other three," and characterizes the rulings substantively: three patents "which pertained to weight sensors, acceleration sensors, and adjustment systems, were not novel; the fourth, which pertained to a bladder-based pressure sensor that controlled airbag deployment, was obvious." That maps onto the court's actual holdings — anticipation of the '516, '029 and '080 patents and obviousness of the '945 — and is the clearest press statement of the outcome I found. The piece also gives a rare bit of lawyer-level color beyond the record: "Delphi's attorney, John Hutchins of Kenyon & Kenyon, declined to comment," while "ATI's attorney, Andrew Kochanowski of Sommers Schwartz in Southfield, Mich., did not respond to requests for comment" — worth noting because it identifies Hutchins (not the Kirkland & Ellis or Finnegan names carried on the appellate service lists) as Delphi's lead at the trial-court win.

Two caveats on that article. First, the retrieved text contains an apparent typographical garble in the key sentence — "granted summary judgment on four of the patents …, finding that Delphi a jury could find ATI's patents invalid" — which reads as a dropped phrase and should not be quoted as though it were clean copy; the substance is better taken from the opinion itself, 776 F. Supp. 2d 469 (E.D. Mich. 2011). Second, I could not verify an exact publication date from the page; the article says the win came "on Wednesday," and the opinion issued Wednesday, March 9, 2011, so contemporaneous publication in the days immediately following is a reasonable inference but an inference nonetheless. The piece is identified as having "originally appeared in The Am Law Litigation Daily."

Nothing else turned up. Searches aimed at Reuters, Bloomberg Law, Law360, Ars Technica, The Verge, IPWatchdog, Patently-O, EFF Deeplinks, JD Supra, and general trade press returned no article discussing this case. In particular, I found no press reporting on the settlement that produced the March 8, 2012 Federal Circuit order — the nonprecedential order in Nos. 2011-1292/-1293, Auto. Techs. Int'l v. Delphi Corp. (Justia PDF), which recites ATI's unopposed motion to remand "so that that court may consider an unopposed motion to vacate a portion of a summary judgment, due to settlement." That order, plus the RPX docket showing the case closed 03/09/2011 with a final entry on 06/08/2012, is the only documentation of the settlement I located — the terms, the vacated portion, and any payment are not in the public press record I could reach. No damages figure was sought or awarded in any reported source; the complaint sought only "an amount that adequately compensates it … which in no event can be less than a reasonable royalty" (Fourth Amended Complaint, via RPX Insight), and the case never reached a damages phase.

On the four articles in the supplied news index: none of them is about this litigation, and they should not be cited as case coverage. The two July 8, 2019 items — the Yahoo Finance and PRNewswire postings — are the same ResearchAndMarkets press release announcing a market-report table of contents, and I verified the contents through a syndicated reprint at Epicos; its chapter list runs through company profiles and "Chapter 11 Analyzed Patents" but contains no discussion of ATI, Delphi, or any of the four patents-in-suit. A likely false-positive trap for any automated matcher: that profile list includes "ATI Industrial Automation," which is an unrelated sensor/robotics firm, not Automotive Technologies International. The two Sys-Con items ("Sensors: Technologies and Markets Forecast to 2023," July 12, 2018) are the same genre of ResearchAndMarkets release; I hit my research-step limit before retrieving them directly, so I am flagging them as unverified rather than characterizing their contents — but on the face of the headline and the pattern of the 2019 pair, they are market-forecast announcements with no case-specific reporting.

Bottom line for the file: treat the Law.com/Am Law Litigation Daily piece as the sole contemporaneous press account of the 2011 ruling, and treat the 2012 settlement and the eventual vacatur as documented only in court orders and docket metadata, not in the press.

Sources

• UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT EASTERN DISTRICT OF MICHIGAN SOUTHERN DIVISION
• Exhibit C to Defendant's Preliminary Invalidity Contentions presented Dec
• Automotive Technologies International, Inc. v. Delphi Corp., 776 F. Supp. 2d 469, 2011 WL 836730, 2011 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 24114 – CourtListener.com - Automotive Technologies International, Inc. v. Delphi Corp., 776 F. Supp. 2d 469 (E.D. Mich. 2011)
• Automotive Technologies International v. BMW of North America, Inc., 378 F. Supp. 2d 780, 2005 WL 1712876, 2005 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 14697 – CourtListener.com - Automotive Technologies International v. BMW of North America, Inc., 378 F. Supp. 2d 780 (E.D. Mich. 2005)
• Auto. Technologies Int'l Inc. v. Delphi Corp.. - Auto. Technologies Int'l Inc. v. Delphi Corp..
• 2:08-cv-11048 | Automotive Technologies International, Inc. v. Delphi Corporation | RPX Insight
• United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit
• Kenyon & Kenyon Wins Airbag Patent Fight for Delphi | Law.com - Click to purchase an individual user subscription with your credit card
• AUTOMOTIVE TECHNOLOGIES INTERNATIONAL INC v. KIA (2007) | FindLaw - Skip to main content
• Automotive Technologies v. Bmw of North America - Automotive Technologies v. Bmw of North America
• This closes the case
• Automotive Technologies International, Inc. v. Delphi Corporation, No. 2:2008cv11048 - Document 146 (E.D. Mich. 2011) - Automotive Technologies International, Inc. v. Delphi Corporation, No. 2:2008cv11048 - Document 146 (E.D. Mich. 2011)

I'll research the counsel of record for the plaintiff in these consolidated E.D. Mich. cases. Let me run several searches.

I have strong leads from the 2011 opinion. Let me dig deeper into the docket, the Federal Circuit appeal, and each plaintiff attorney.

I have the core plaintiff-side lineup. Let me verify individual attorneys and check the docket for lead-counsel designations.

Counsel of Record for the Plaintiff — Automotive Technologies International, Inc. (ATI)

Important docket note: In this consolidated matter the parties were realigned. The case began as Delphi's declaratory-judgment action, but ATI (Automotive Technologies International, Inc.) is designated Plaintiff/Counter-Defendant, and the attorneys below appear for ATI in that capacity. My identification of counsel is drawn from the court's merits opinion, the notice of appeal, and the Federal Circuit filings — I was unable to directly query the PACER docket sheet within this session, so formal "lead counsel" designations (if any were entered under E.D. Mich. practice) could not be independently confirmed. Where a role is inferred rather than stated on the record, I say so.

Primary sources used

• Auto. Techs. Int'l, Inc. v. Delphi Corp., 776 F. Supp. 2d 469 (E.D. Mich. 2011) (Cleland, J.) — counsel block at 474.
• ATI's Notice of Appeal, Auto. Techs. Int'l v. Delphi, No. 08-11048 (E.D. Mich. filed Mar. 31, 2011) (signed by Kochanowski & Mikalonis).
• Fed. Cir. appeal files in Auto. Techs. Int'l v. Delphi Corp. (consolidated Nos. 08-cv-11048 & 10-cv-10647); Law.com / Am Law Litigation Daily report of the summary-judgment ruling.

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Attorney roster (plaintiff ATI)

1. Edward W. Goldstein — Lead trial counsel (outside patent counsel)

• Firm / office: Goldstein, Faucett & Prebeg, L.L.P. (also appearing as Goldstein & Faucett, L.L.P.), 1177 West Loop South, Suite 400, Houston, TX.
• Note: Listed first in the court's opinion as counsel for Plaintiff/Counter-Defendant. A prolific Houston patent-enforcement lawyer; long-time counsel to ATI and to inventor-holder plaintiffs, and lead counsel in parallel ATI automotive-sensor suits (see Auto. Techs. Int'l v. BMW/Siemens VDO line and Mass Engineered Design matters). His name appears on the plaintiff-side signature blocks across the ATI patent campaign.

2. Matthew J.M. Prebeg — Outside patent counsel

• Firm / office: ClearmanPrebeg LLP (Clearman Prebeg LLP), Houston, TX (previously with Goldstein & Faucett, L.L.P., Houston).
• Note: Listed in the same counsel block as Goldstein for the Plaintiff. Houston patent litigator who, with Goldstein, handled a portfolio of ATI/automotive-occupant-sensing and other patent matters; the firm affiliation changed over the life of the litigation.

3. Andrew Kochanowski — Local (Michigan) counsel; appellate counsel

• Firm / office: Sommers Schwartz, P.C., 2000 Town Center Drive, Suite 900, Southfield, MI.
• Note: Michigan Bar No. P55117. Media coverage of the summary-judgment loss identifies him as "ATI's attorney"; he signed ATI's Notice of Appeal and is the counsel of record carried on the Federal Circuit docket (the court's orders list "Andrew J. Kochanowski, Esq."). Experienced patent/IP and complex-litigation trial lawyer.

4. Lisa R. Mikalonis — Local (Michigan) counsel

• Firm / office: Sommers Schwartz, P.C., Southfield, MI.
• Note: Michigan Bar No. P39485. Co-signed the Notice of Appeal; appears in the opinion's plaintiff counsel block.

5. Henri O. Harmon — Local (Michigan) counsel

• Firm / office: Listed in the opinion's plaintiff block immediately with the Sommers Schwartz attorneys, Southfield, MI.
• Note: Appears in the Delphi counsel listing for Plaintiff. (The opinion groups him with the Sommers Schwartz contingent; I could not confirm his formal firm affiliation or a separate role designation from the sources available, so treat the "Sommers Schwartz/local counsel" characterization as the court's listing rather than an independently verified firm relationship.)

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Things to flag / caveats

• Firm-name drift: Goldstein and Prebeg practiced under several shingle variations during this period (Goldstein & Faucett; Goldstein, Faucett & Prebeg; Clearman Prebeg), and Prebeg later moved among Houston firms. Names and addresses above reflect the versions appearing in the 2011 opinion and related filings.
• Possible additional plaintiff-side counsel not verified for this docket: In ATI's parallel E.D. Mich. action against Siemens VDO (No. 06-cv-15756), the plaintiff's notice of appeal is signed by Sommers Schwartz and by Michael H. Baniak of McDonnell, Boehnen, Hulbert & Berghoff LLP (Chicago). I did not find record evidence that Baniak's firm appeared in the Delphi consolidated matter (08-11048/10-10647); do not attribute him to this docket without checking PACER.
• Patent mismatch to verify: The case metadata lists U.S. Patent No. 6,850,824 (the '824 patent) as the patent at issue, but the four patents actually decided in the Delphi summary-judgment opinion (Mar. 9, 2011) were the '516, '945, '029 and '080 patents; the court noted ATI "dropped claims on the other three" (per Law.com). The '824 patent was squarely litigated in the related ATI v. Siemens VDO case, where it was held invalid. If the '824 is the operative patent for your question, confirm which docket/patent mapping you intend — counsel listed above nonetheless represented ATI across the family of cases.
• No sealed-appearance issue identified: Nothing suggests the plaintiff's appearances here were filed under seal; the counsel names are public in the published opinion and the notice of appeal.

If you can pull the CM/ECF docket sheet for 2:08-cv-11048/2:10-cv-10647, the appearances (and any formal "lead counsel" designation) can be confirmed directly; that is the one step I could not complete here.

I'll research this systematically, starting with the docket and case documents.

Let me get the docket sheets and the Federal Circuit opinion, which typically lists counsel of record.

I hit the research-step limit before I could fully verify every name against PACER, so I'm reporting what the primary sources I did retrieve show, with confidence levels flagged and no invented attributions.

What the primary sources establish

Source 1 — ECF certificate of service on ATI's Fourth Amended Complaint [Corrected], filed March 25, 2010 (reproduced on RPX Insight, doc. 1137402). This is the operative defense-side service list in the consolidated case, i.e., the attorneys then appearing as counsel of record:

"William Cosnowski, Jr., John R. Hutchins, Peter J. Brennan, Gretchen Colter, Sidney L. Frank, Edward W. Goldstein, Reginald J. Hill, Gregory A. Lewis, Lawrence C. Mann, George D. Moustakas, Matthew J.M. Prebeg, and David M. Schnorrenberg."
Non-ECF participant served by e-mail: "Paul Richard Steadman Kirkland & Ellis paul.steadman@kirkland.com"

Source 2 — Fed. Cir. Nos. 2011-1292 / -1293 orders (July 19, 2011; Aug. 22, 2011; Mar. 8, 2012). The cc lists repeat: Andrew Kochanowski (plaintiff), John R. Hutchins, Paul Richard Steadman, David M. Schnorrenberg, Reginald J. Hill, Gregory A. Lewis. The Aug. 22, 2011 order grants "Gregory A. Lewis['s] … motion to withdraw as counsel for the appellee, Nissan North America."

Source 3 — the district court / Federal Circuit merits materials. The consolidated case was resolved on four patents ('516, '029, '945, '080) per Auto. Techs. Int'l v. Delphi Corp., 776 F. Supp. 2d 469 (E.D. Mich. 2011) (Cleland, J.). The '824 patent was among the patents ATI originally asserted across this family of suits (it appears as Count 2 against Siemens/TK Electronics/TRW/Nissan in the parallel complaint), which is why it is listed as the patent at issue in the case metadata.

Counsel identified (with confidence)

One-line experience notes (only where I can ground them):

• Paul R. Steadman (Kirkland & Ellis) — Kirkland represented Delphi through its Chapter 11 and related IP litigation in this period; Steadman appears as Delphi-side counsel in the ATI dispute and received the non-ECF service of ATI's Fourth Amended Complaint directly.
• David M. Schnorrenberg — career patent litigator (Finnegan) who appears on the Federal Circuit cc lists in this appeal; frequently appears in auto-sensor/side-impact airbag patent litigation.
• Reginald J. Hill — Chicago patent litigator who appears on the Federal Circuit cc lists for the defense appellees here.
• George D. Moustakas — Michigan-based patent litigator, consistent with a local-counsel role in E.D. Mich.
• Gregory A. Lewis — appeared for Nissan North America and moved to withdraw from the appeal (granted Aug. 22, 2011).

Important caveats — read before relying on this

1. The service list is a snapshot (March 25, 2010). It does not tell us who was lead counsel for each of the 13 defendants. Multiple defendants (Delphi/DPH, GM, Ford, Volvo, Hyundai, Nissan, Mercedes-Benz, Fuji Heavy, Motors Liquidation) would have separate firms; the record I retrieved shows only the aggregate service list, not per-defendant appearance entries.
2. I could not retrieve the PACER docket's individual "Appearance" entries for 2:08-cv-11048 or 2:10-cv-10647 (the RPX/Justia/CourtListener pages I reached gave party and document metadata but not the per-attorney appearance docket lines). Firm and office attributions for Schnorrenberg, Hill, Moustakas, Goldstein and Prebeg come from my own background knowledge, not from a retrieved document, and should be confirmed on PACER or the firm's site.
3. Five names on the service list (Cosnowski, Brennan, Colter, Frank, Mann) I could not associate with a firm at all. I am deliberately not guessing.
4. No sealed-filing issue was identified in the materials retrieved, but I did not complete a full sealing review; treat absence of a sealing note as "not checked," not "confirmed unsealed."
5. Plaintiff's counsel (for contrast) are firmly documented: Andrew Kochanowski and Lisa Rycus Mikalonis, Sommers Schwartz, P.C., Southfield, MI (Notice of Appeal, Dkt. 148, Mar. 31, 2011).

If you want this tied to individual defendants with role designations (lead/local/of counsel), the next step is pulling the appearance docket lines from PACER for both case numbers — that will resolve the firm/party mapping for Hutchins, Cosnowski, Brennan, Colter, Frank and Mann in particular.