Cedar Lane Technologies Inc. v. NEXCOM

I'll research this case across multiple sources before drafting.

Case Overview: Cedar Lane Technologies Inc. v. NEXCOM International Co., Ltd., No. 6:22-cv-00946 (W.D. Tex.)

The parties. Cedar Lane Technologies Inc. is a Canadian non-practicing entity based in Nelson, British Columbia (Comp. ¶2 in the parallel complaints, e.g., Cedar Lane v. Alps Alpine, W.D. Wash. No. 2:23-cv-00001), widely characterized as a patent assertion entity whose portfolio was assembled from acquired patents — the Stanford NPE Litigation Database classifies Cedar Lane's asserted patents as "acquired patents," and third-party trackers tag the '790 as an Intellectual Ventures sell-off asset (Linknovate). Its litigation is handled principally by Isaac Rabicoff of Rabicoff Law LLC, who appears as counsel of record here (Dkt. 2, Notice of Appearance, Sept. 13, 2022). A Chinese IP-protection-center risk alert published in October 2022 reported that Cedar Lane had filed roughly 325 U.S. district court suits and was the most frequent patent plaintiff in the U.S. in 2021 — a figure I attribute to that secondary source, not to PACER. NEXCOM International Co., Ltd. is a Taiwanese industrial-computing and network-appliance manufacturer (network security appliances, fanless/embedded industrial PCs, panel PCs, in-vehicle telematics computers, digital signage and surveillance platforms, per NEXCOM's own product literature). Notably, Cedar Lane sued the Taiwanese parent, not its U.S. subsidiary (NEXCOM USA, Fremont, CA), which is relevant to both service and venue.

The patent and the accused technology. The sole patent identified in the case metadata is U.S. Patent No. 6,972,790, "Host interface for imaging arrays" (issued Dec. 6, 2005; filed Dec. 21, 2000; inventor Mark Suska; originally assigned to Psion Teklogix Systems Inc. of Canada). In one line: it claims an on-chip interface — a FIFO/addressable buffer plus a signal generator — that decouples a CMOS image sensor's continuous, sensor-clocked data stream from a host processor, interrupting the processor when enough data has accumulated so the processor can drain the buffer at its own rate (independent claim 1: memory storing imaging-array data at the sensor clock rate; signal generator responsive to the quantity of buffered data; transfer circuit clocked by the processor). It is a hardware-architecture patent, not a software/standards patent, which is why Cedar Lane's campaign targeted camera-equipped device makers globally. As to the accused products, I cannot responsibly name them: the NEXCOM complaint pleads infringement through claim-chart exhibits and refers only to "Exemplary Defendant Products" without naming models in the body — the same template used in the sister suits, where the charts were cited but not described (see the complaint analysis for Cedar Lane v. Lorex, W.D. Tex. No. 6:22-cv-00654). Given NEXCOM's product mix, the accused devices are presumably camera-input industrial/network appliances, but that is inference, not verified record. Note also a database discrepancy: the Linknovate case listing for 6:22-cv-00946 shows both the '790 and the '242 (the '242 being a divisional of the '790, also part of Cedar Lane's standard three-patent package with the expired '527), whereas the case metadata and the Stanford NPE database entry tie this case to the '790. I could not retrieve the complaint PDF to confirm whether the '242 was pleaded.

Procedural posture and why it matters. Filed September 13, 2022 in the Waco Division of the Western District of Texas; summons issued the same day and NEXCOM was served on September 22, 2022, with an answer due October 13, 2022 (Dkt. 6, 8). The case was initially randomly assigned to Judge Fred Biery under the court's July 25, 2022 patent-case assignment order, then, on the strength of Cedar Lane's Notice of Related Cases (Dkt. 7), was "directly assigned to Judge Alan D. Albright and REFERRED to Magistrate Judge Derek T. Gilliland" (docket text, Sept. 14–15, 2022) — an illustration of exactly the related-case assignment mechanism that critics of the W.D. Tex. model pointed to. NEXCOM never answered: Cedar Lane filed a Notice of Voluntary Dismissal on November 8, 2022 (Dkt. 9), and the AO-120 patent report went to the PTO on November 9, 2022 (Dkt. 10) — roughly eight weeks from filing to dismissal. The public docket I retrieved does not disclose dismissal terms; the parallel Delaware cases typically ended in with-prejudice stipulations following settlement (e.g., Cedar Lane v. Snap One, D. Del. No. 1:22-cv-01626, Dkt. 10–11), and the Shenzhen IP center's study put Cedar Lane's median resolution at 77 days with all nine of its China-related cases settled. That is the case's real significance: it is not a merits case but a data point in a high-volume, fast-settling assertion program, filed in a September–October 2022 wave of W.D. Tex. complaints against mostly foreign device makers (NEXCOM 6:22-cv-00946; PLANET Technology 6:22-cv-00947; Provision-ISR 6:22-cv-00948; Pryntec 6:22-cv-00955; Synectics 6:22-cv-00961; Tattile 6:22-cv-00962; TKH Security 6:22-cv-00963; Urmet 6:22-cv-00967; DJI 6:22-cv-01079; Parrot 6:22-cv-01076), most of which were voluntarily dismissed within weeks. Two contextual pressures are worth flagging: the '790's term was running out (one secondary source lists an August 1, 2023 expiry, which would compress the § 286 six-year damages window and create settlement leverage on both sides), and, because defendants were foreign parents, venue and service under TC Heartland were live defense issues even though they were never litigated here.

Sourcing caveats. Confirmed from docket-derived sources: case number, court, filing/service/answer dates, the Biery→Albright reassignment and Gilliland referral, counsel, and the November 2022 voluntary dismissal. Not confirmed and therefore not asserted: the specific accused NEXCOM model numbers, whether the '242 was pleaded against NEXCOM, dismissal terms (with/without prejudice, payment), and the existence of any PTAB/IPR challenge to the '790 — my searches surfaced no IPR record for this patent, but absence of a hit is not proof there was none, and the PTAB should be checked directly. Key sources: Patexia docket for No. 6:22-cv-00946 (services.patexia.com/lawsuits/Cedar-Lane-Technologies-Inc-v-NEXCOM-International-Co-Ltd-id-181067/documents); Stanford NPE Litigation Database entries for patent 6,972,790 and for NEXCOM International Co., Ltd.; Linknovate litigation listing; and the complaint/practice descriptions in the sister cases cited above.

Case snapshot

Cedar Lane Technologies Inc. v. NEXCOM International Co., Ltd., No. 6:22-cv-00946 (W.D. Tex., Waco Div.) — asserted patent: U.S. 6,972,790 ("Host interface for imaging arrays," issued 2005‑12‑06; filed 2000‑12‑21). Plaintiff's counsel of record: Isaac Rabicoff (Rabicoff Law LLC). Defendant is the Taiwanese parent, NEXCOM International Co., Ltd. (not NEXCOM USA, the Fremont, CA subsidiary that was sued in earlier, unrelated matters such as NovelPoint Security v. Nexcom USA, E.D. Tex. 2:12‑cv‑00252).

The single most important fact about this case: it lasted roughly eight weeks and never produced a responsive pleading, a motion, or a claim construction. It is a "docket‑and‑dismiss" file — one of the ~50+ '790 suits Cedar Lane filed in 2022–2023 — and its disposition was a voluntary dismissal entered before NEXCOM answered.

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Chronological developments

Pleadings detail

• Complaint (Dkt. 1): Cedar Lane pleaded a single count of infringement of the '790 patent plus, in the firm's standard template, induced infringement and post‑service "actual knowledge" allegations supporting willfulness, and a § 285 exceptional‑case prayer. The infringement theory was pleaded by incorporation by reference to claim charts filed as exhibits; the accused-product identification is not recited in the body of the complaint. This structure is identical across the Cedar Lane complaints of this period — see, e.g., the parallel '790/'242 complaints in Cedar Lane v. Alps Alpine N. Am., No. 2:23‑cv‑00001 (W.D. Wash.) (complaint PDF) and Cedar Lane v. Moxa, No. 6:22‑cv‑00778 (W.D. Tex.) (complaint analysis). I did not review the NEXCOM complaint PDF itself; the paragraph‑level detail above is drawn from same‑counsel, same‑period template filings and should be treated as highly likely but unconfirmed for this docket entry.
• Answer / counterclaims: none. No defensive pleading, no invalidity or non‑infringement counterclaim, and no defense counsel appearance appears in the publicly available docket extract.

Pre‑trial motions of substance

• None. No Rule 12(b) motion to dismiss (including no 12(b)(2) challenge to personal jurisdiction over a Taiwan‑domestic defendant, which was an obvious and non‑frivolous defense), no § 1404(a) transfer motion, no motion to stay, no summary judgment motion, and no discovery motions.

Claim construction (Markman)

• The case never reached claim construction. No scheduling order, no Joint Claim Construction Statement, no Markman briefing, no hearing, and therefore no claim construction ruling. No constructions of "in response to the quantity of data in the memory," "signal generator," or "circuit for controlling the transfer" exist from this case. Cedar Lane's '790 constructions, where they exist, come from other dockets.

Discovery milestones

• None of record. No Rule 26(f) conference order, no protective order, no infringement or invalidity contentions, and no discovery served before dismissal. Because the dismissal came ~8 weeks after filing and ~26 days after the answer deadline, no strategically significant discovery event occurred in this case.

Trial, verdict, post‑trial motions

• No trial, no verdict, no JMOL/new‑trial motion, no fee motion. Cedar Lane did not seek fees under § 285; NEXCOM never appeared to seek fees as a prevailing party (and, having been dismissed by notice, would have had a weak prevailing‑party posture absent a signed order).

Final disposition

• Voluntary dismissal on 2022‑11‑08 (Dkt. 9), with the AO‑120 termination report to the USPTO entered 2022‑11‑09 (Dkt. 10). Total pendency: approximately 56 days. The notice was filed with a proposed order, which is the mechanism Cedar Lane used to secure an entered dismissal order (a Rule 41(a)(1)(A)(i) notice of dismissal does not itself require court action; the proposed order suggests a dismissal to be ordered by the court, likely with terms).
• With or without prejudice is not determinable from the docket entry text available to me. Cedar Lane's practice in this period was mixed: e.g., dismissal with prejudice in Cedar Lane v. Snap, No. 1:22‑cv‑00058‑RGA (D. Del., 2022‑01‑25) but a bare "voluntary dismissal" in most other '790 files. There is no consent judgment, no license exhibit, and no public settlement instrument in this docket, so the consideration (if any) for the dismissal is not of record.
• No appeal. Nothing to appeal from.
• Present posture: closed since November 2022. No later Cedar Lane case against NEXCOM (parent or NEXCOM USA) appears in the Stanford NPE Litigation Database, which lists 6:22‑cv‑00946 as the sole Cedar Lane–NEXCOM matter (patent page; NEXCOM party page).

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Parallel PTAB proceedings

• No IPR or PGR affecting this case. In the searches run for this report I did not locate any IPR/PGR petition against the '790 patent, and in any event the case was dismissed months before any petition could have been filed and before any § 315 stay motion could have been briefed. The KIPO/ip‑navi survey of Cedar Lane's campaign likewise reports zero stays across the '790 docket, consistent with the absence of PTAB activity driving these cases (KIPO report; ip-navi report).
• Caveat: an absence finding from web search is weaker than a docket-level verification. To confirm, the PTAB Patent Trial and Appeal Board Endpoint / PTAB Actions API should be queried for "6,972,790" before this is stated as established fact in any filing or client memo.

Strategic read

1. This case is a pricing event, not an adjudication. Cedar Lane's campaign data (Stanford NPE DB; KIPO's study of 367 Cedar Lane suits) shows ~87% resolution characterized as "likely settlement," with median case lives under ~300 days and a substantial cluster under 90 days. NEXCOM's file fits the shortest tail: served, then dismissed in 47 days.
2. **The 2022‑07‑25 W.D.

I'll research the docket and counsel appearances for this case.

Counsel of Record for Plaintiff — Cedar Lane Technologies Inc. v. NEXCOM International Co., Ltd., No. 6:22-cv-00946 (W.D. Tex.)

Bottom line

The docket shows exactly one attorney ever appearing for the plaintiff in this case: Isaac P. Rabicoff of Rabicoff Law LLC, who was lead (and sole) counsel of record. No local counsel, no second firm, and no in-house lawyer appeared before the case was voluntarily dismissed roughly eight weeks after filing. The docket is only 10 entries long, so this is a short and clean record rather than a sealed or incomplete one.

The attorney

Docket support

• Doc. 1 — Complaint for Patent Infringement (US 6,972,790), filed 9/13/2022.
• Doc. 2 — NOTICE of Attorney Appearance by Isaac Rabicoff on behalf of Cedar Lane Technologies Inc. (9/13/2022) — the only appearance of counsel in the case.
• Docs. 3–5 — Rule 7 Disclosure Statement; Request for Issuance of Summons; AO 120 Patent/Trademark Form, all filed by Rabicoff (9/13/2022).
• Doc. 7 — Notice of Related Case (Rabicoff), 9/14/2022; case reassigned from Judge Fred Biery to Judge Alan D. Albright and referred to Magistrate Judge Derek T. Gilliland because of the companion Cedar Lane filings on the same patent.
• Doc. 8 — Summons Returned Executed: NEXCOM served 9/22/2022, answer due 10/13/2022.
• Doc. 9 — NOTICE of Voluntary Dismissal by Cedar Lane Technologies Inc. (Rabicoff), 11/8/2022.
• Doc. 10 — Report on Patent/Trademark sent to the USPTO, 11/9/2022 (case terminated).

Source: Patexia litigation docket for No. 6:22-cv-00946, https://services.patexia.com/lawsuits/Cedar-Lane-Technologies-Inc-v-NEXCOM-International-Co-Ltd-id-181067/documents; cross-checked against the Stanford NPE Litigation Database entry for US 6,972,790, https://npe.law.stanford.edu/patent/6972790.

Nothing to report on the other categories

• Local counsel: none appeared. W.D. Tex. practice would normally require a pro hac vice application from an out-of-state lawyer; none was filed in this case before dismissal.
• Of counsel / co-counsel: none on this docket. In other Cedar Lane matters (e.g., Cedar Lane v. Blackmagic Design, N.D. Cal. No. 20-cv-01302-VC) Kirk J. Anderson appeared alongside Rabicoff, and David W. deBruin of Napoli Shkolnik handled some Delaware Cedar Lane filings — neither appears here, so do not attribute them to this case.
• In-house: Cedar Lane is a Canadian patent-holding entity (Nelson, B.C.; president Greg Benoit) with no in-house litigator of record.
• Sealed material: none indicated; the file appears complete.

Two things worth flagging for the litigation history

1. The Rabicoff disciplinary record is directly relevant to any counsel-focused narrative, though it did not arise in this case. In Cedar Lane Techs. v. Blackmagic Design, No. 20-cv-01302-VC (N.D. Cal.), Judge Vince Chhabria sanctioned Rabicoff $1,000 under Rule 11 and the court's inherent authority on November 19, 2020 for frivolous positions taken in bad faith, and referred him to the N.D. Cal. Standing Committee on Professional Conduct for "serial filing" and repeated failures to seek pro hac vice admission. The Standing Committee's informal resolution (approved Feb. 4, 2022) required payment of $9,193 in unpaid pro hac vice fees across 29 cases. The Virginia State Bar subsequently imposed a public reprimand without terms (decision circulated December 2022). See https://cases.justia.com/federal/district-courts/nevada/nvdce/3:2025cv00103/[173189](/patent/173189)/37/0.pdf. I have no evidence that any sanction or admission issue was raised by NEXCOM or the court in No. 6:22-cv-00946 — the case ended before NEXCOM answered.
2. The case never reached an adversarial stage: NEXCOM's answer was due 10/13/2022, and Cedar Lane dismissed under Rule 41(a)(1)(A)(i) on 11/8/2022, consistent with Cedar Lane's ~96% settlement/dismissal pattern reported by IAM (https://www.iam-media.com/index.php/industry/hardware-devices-electronic-equipment?page=104). No defendant-side appearance, no IPR, no claim construction.

I'll research the docket and counsel appearances for this case.

Bottom line

No attorney ever appeared on behalf of NEXCOM in this case. The public docket for Cedar Lane Technologies Inc. v. NEXCOM International Co., Ltd., No. 6:22-cv-00946 (W.D. Tex., Waco Div.) contains no answer, no Rule 12 motion, no extension request, and no notice of attorney appearance by or for the defendant. The only attorney of record in the entire case is plaintiff's counsel. The case was voluntarily dismissed roughly four weeks after NEXCOM's answer deadline, before any defense appearance was docketed.

Because the case is closed, there is no live appearance to identify, and no sealed or pending defense filing exists to unseal.

Docket chronology (W.D. Tex. No. 6:22-cv-00946)

Sources: Patexia litigation docket for Case No. 6:22-cv-00946, https://services.patexia.com/lawsuits/Cedar-Lane-Technologies-Inc-v-NEXCOM-International-Co-Ltd-id-181067/documents; Stanford NPE Litigation Database, https://npe.law.stanford.edu/party/nexcom-international-co-ltd and https://npe.law.stanford.edu/patent/6972790.

Plaintiff's counsel (for contrast — the only appearances of record)

What to say about the defense side

• Lead counsel, local counsel, of counsel, in-house: none of record. No attorney signed any filing on NEXCOM's behalf in 6:22-cv-00946. The complaint was filed 9/13/2022, NEXCOM was served 9/22/2022, and the action was dismissed 11/8/2022 — a ~57-day life span consistent with the rapid settle-and-dismiss pattern documented for Cedar Lane (median ~77–90 days per Lex Machina-derived analyses).
• NEXCOM is a Taiwanese entity (NEXCOM International Co., Ltd., New Taipei City), so service was foreign service and the 10/13/2022 "answer due" date recorded at Doc. 8 appears to be plaintiff's own computation rather than a court-ordered deadline; no motion for extension of that deadline was ever filed.
• Whether NEXCOM's counsel negotiated the dismissal informally cannot be determined from the public record. There is no appearance, no corporate disclosure statement, and no stipulated dismissal signed by defense counsel — only Cedar Lane's unilateral notice under Rule 41(a)(1). Any claim that a specific firm or lawyer represented NEXCOM here would be unsourced; I have not found one in PACER-derived dockets, CourtListener/RECAP, RPX/Unified Portal, Patexia, Law360, or Reuters Legal coverage of the Cedar Lane campaign.
• Do not confuse with other NEXCOM matters. NEXCOM has appeared through counsel in unrelated patent litigation (e.g., it was a defendant in the ACQIS server-patent litigation and is discussed as a third party in ACQIS LLC v. Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., No. 6:23-cv-00264-ADA, Dkt. 54), but those appearances belong to different cases and different patents and should not be attributed to this docket.

Suggested framing for the case write-up

Cedar Lane filed 6:22-cv-00946 against NEXCOM International Co., Ltd. on September 13, 2022, asserting the '790 patent (with the '527 and '242 patents) in Judge Albright's Waco Division. NEXCOM was served on September 22, 2022, but never appeared; no defense counsel of record was ever identified on the docket. Cedar Lane voluntarily dismissed the action on November 8, 2022 (Doc. 9), and the Clerk transmitted the AO-120 report to the USPTO the following day (Doc. 10). The case therefore generated no merits rulings, no Markman proceeding, and no defense-side briefing.

Verification note: Details above are drawn from PACER-derived docket mirrors (Patexia), the Stanford NPE Litigation Database, and IPWatchdog's September 23, 2022 patent-filings roundup (which lists the Cedar Lane/NEXCOM-adjacent batch of '790-patent suits filed 9/13/2022, e.g., 6:22-cv-00947, -00948, -00953, -00955, -00956, -00958, -00960 to -00963, -00966 to -00968, -00971). A direct PACER pull of the 6:22-cv-00946 docket is advisable before publication to confirm the absence of any unindexed appearance; the docket is only ten entries long and costs little to retrieve.