CommWorks Solutions, LLC v. Charter Communications, Inc. et al.

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

Let me dig into the specifics of this case and the parties.

Case Overview: CommWorks Solutions, LLC v. Charter Communications, Inc. et al., No. 6:22-cv-00156 (W.D. Tex.)

The parties. CommWorks Solutions, LLC is a patent-assertion entity (NPE/PAE) — RPX classifies the case as an "NPE" suit and Stanford's NPE Litigation Database codes the patents as "acquired patents." Its Rule 7.1 disclosure statements in related suits identify Brainbox Innovations, LLC as its corporate parent, and CommWorks is one of a family of Brainbox/"IP Investments"-controlled assertion vehicles (alongside DataCloud Techs., DigiMedia Tech., CDN Innovations). In the parallel Delaware declaratory judgment action brought by Altice USA, Altice alleged that these portfolios were 2019–2020 sell-offs from Intellectual Ventures and that IV retained a security interest plus a "backend" share of licensing revenue — an allegation worth flagging as an allegation, not an established fact (IPWatchdog, Sept. 22, 2021; Altice USA v. CommWorks Solutions, 1:21-cv-01323-UNA (D. Del.)). On the defense side, Charter Communications, Inc. is one of the largest U.S. cable/broadband operators (Spectrum brand), and co-defendant Spectrum Gulf Coast, LLC is the Charter operating subsidiary behind the Spectrum-branded cable systems in the Gulf Coast region (Texas/Louisiana) — i.e., the in-district operating entity that actually delivers the accused services (Justia docket; RPX Insight).

Accused technology. The suit is a willful-infringement action under 35 U.S.C. § 271 (jury demand) targeting Charter's Spectrum broadband/Internet service delivery and the network equipment and customer-premises equipment (cable modems/gateways and associated access gear) used to provision that service. RPX's case page lists five accused products and places the case in the "Networking" market sector. CommWorks's complaints in factually parallel suits tie the same patent family to IEEE 802.3ah ("Ethernet in the First Mile"), GPON/XG-PON (ITU-T G.984/G.9807.1), and multi-layer QoS functionality — e.g., in CommWorks v. NextLink the '249 count accused Ciena devices running SAOS and Juniper devices running Junos OS supporting 802.3ah; in CommWorks v. EarthLink it accused 802.3ah-capable gateways (Compl. ¶¶17, 22). I could not retrieve the text of the Charter complaint itself to confirm the specific product list, so the precise accused instrumentalities here are an inference from the campaign pattern rather than something I can cite directly.

Patents asserted. Case metadata flags U.S. Patent No. 6,832,249, "Globally Accessible Computer Network-Based Broadband Communication System with User-Controllable Quality of Information Delivery and Flow Priority" (App. No. 09/860,801, filed May 18, 2001; issued Dec. 14, 2004). In one line: it claims a method/system for providing broadband communications across multiple OSI-model layers — monitor a quality-of-service event arising at layer N, respond by changing network provisioning at a layer less than N, and signal that the provisioning change (asserted claims have historically included claims 11 and 31; see the '249 counts in the NextLink and EarthLink complaints). RPX counts six patents-in-suit in this case, and Stanford's database lists the '249 alongside U.S. Pat. 7,177,285 (wireless provisioning, WPS-related) and 7,911,979 (provisioning of a device to a network based on a tracked operating parameter/time interval) as asserted against Charter. Family members CommWorks commonly asserts include the '807 ("Time Based Wireless Access Provisioning"), the '979/'596 (time-based/WPS provisioning), the '465 and its reissue RE44,904 ("Method for Contention Free Traffic Detection" — extracting a bit pattern at an offset and comparing it to a search pattern to flag Wi-Fi priority frames), and the '664 ("determining and provisioning paths in a network"). I did not find a primary source confirming the exact six-patent set in this docket, so treat the full list as partially unverified.

Procedural posture and venue. Filed February 11, 2022 in the Waco Division of the Western District of Texas, assigned to Judge Alan D. Albright (case number styled 6:22-cv-00156-ADA); the parties filed an agreed extension putting the Charter/Spectrum answer deadline at April 21, 2022 (Dkts. 1, 8; Justia docket). Venue matters here for several reasons: Charter has a substantial Texas footprint (Plano-area facilities and retail stores) supporting § 1400(b) venue, and Judge Albright's Waco Division was, in 2021–2022, the nation's busiest and most NPE-favored patent venue — a one-judge division with plaintiff-friendly standing orders and compressed trial schedules. That concentration triggered Federal Circuit mandamus pushback (In re Juniper, Sept. 2021; In re Google, Oct. 2021) and, shortly after this filing, Judge Albright's July 2022 revision of the Waco case-assignment practice. The case is also notable for its apparent early resolution: RPX reports roughly 125 days in litigation, consistent with a mid-2022 termination, and the Stanford database's outcome is unconfirmed — public docket snapshots I could retrieve stop in March 2022, so I cannot confirm whether termination came via settlement, license, or voluntary dismissal.

Why it's notable. (1) Campaign breadth: CommWorks has run a long, vertical NPE campaign across the broadband access chain — cable/ISP operators (Comcast, Charter/Spectrum, RCN, Consolidated Communications, NextLink, EarthLink, Vyve, Extreme Networks) and chipset/CPE makers (Broadcom, STMicroelectronics, NXP, Linksys, Grandstream, Realtek) — asserting a single early-2000s portfolio against standardized features (802.3ah, GPON, WMM/802.11e QoS, WPS), which is the classic "standards-compliant device = infringement" NPE playbook. (2) IPR/reexam linkage: Unified Patents has been the principal defensive challenger — it filed IPR2021-01297 against U.S. Pat. 8,923,846 and an ex parte reexamination of U.S. Pat. 7,760,664, which the USPTO granted on July 1, 2022, less than a month after filing (Unified Patents, "CommWorks reexamination granted," July 5, 2022). (3) Ownership/standing exposure: the Altice DJ action's allegations about the Brainbox/IV revenue-backend structure are the kind of material that fuels standing, real-party-in-interest, and damages-apportionment defenses in suits like this one. (4) Docket significance: as a 2022 Waco NPE filing, it is a useful data point on the Albright docket's composition and on how quickly NPE defendants in that venue were resolving cases at the time.

Sourcing caveats: Party names, case number, filing date, judge, and the '249 patent are confirmed by the Justia/PACER-derived docket and RPX/Stanford records. The accused-product list, the identity of all six asserted patents, defense counsel (Dkt. 8 identifies Deron R. Dacus for defendants; plaintiff's team includes Stafford Davis and Catherine Bartles of the Stafford Davis firm), and the terminal disposition are not confirmed by a primary document I was able to retrieve, and I have not verified every assertion above against PACER directly. If you need certainty on those points, the next step is pulling the Docket 1 complaint and any dismissal order from PACER for 6:22-cv-00156.

I'll research this case thoroughly across dockets, PTAB records, and legal news sources.

Key metadata confirmed. Now let me dig into the specific docket outcome and any PTAB proceedings.

Key Legal Developments & Outcome — CommWorks Solutions, LLC v. Charter Communications, Inc., No. 6:22-cv-00156 (W.D. Tex.)

Bottom line up front: This was a short-lived, single-patent campaign case — roughly 125 days from filing to termination — that never reached claim construction, summary judgment, or trial. It appears to have resolved quietly, most likely by voluntary dismissal following a settlement, consistent with a mid-2022 wave of resolutions across CommWorks' cable-operator campaign. I flag below where the record is thin.

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1. Filing & Initial Pleadings

2022-02-11 — Complaint filed. CommWorks Solutions, LLC filed a one-patent infringement action against Charter Communications, Inc. and Spectrum Gulf Coast, LLC in the Waco Division of W.D. Tex., assigned to Judge Alan D. Albright.

• Docket No. 6:22-cv-00156; cause of action 35 U.S.C. § 271; jury demand.
• Asserted patent: U.S. Patent No. 6,832,249 ("Globally Accessible Computer Network-Based Broadband Communication System with User-Controllable Quality of Information Delivery and Flow Priority"), issued 2004-12-14 from App. No. 09/860,801, filed 2001-05-18.
• Same-day filings: Rule 7.1 disclosure statement (Doc. 4); AO 120 patent form forwarded to USPTO (Doc. 3); summons issued as to both defendants (Docs. 5–6).
• Plaintiff's counsel of record included Stafford Grigsby Helm Davis, Catherine Bartles, Andrey Belenky, Dmitry Kheyfits, and Brandon Moore (per the UniCourt/docket party listing; third-party aggregators attribute these attorneys to Kheyfits Belenky LLP and The Stafford Davis Firm (Tyler, TX)). Source: Justia docket; UniCourt.

2022-02-15 — Agreed extension of time to respond. Defendants filed a Notice of Agreed Extension (Doc. 8), through local counsel Deron R. Dacus. The court reset answers to 2022-04-21.

2022-03-10 — Standing-orders update. Clerk's entry directing compliance with Judge Albright's Standing Order Governing Proceedings 4.0 (Patent Cases), the Notice of Readiness order, and related COVID-19/sealing orders.

Record gap / caveat: The Justia and UniCourt dockets were last retrieved in March–April 2022, and neither reflects any answer, counterclaim, or motion to dismiss. RPX logs 125 days in litigation with the terminal outcome unconfirmed, and the Stanford NPE database leaves the termination date blank. I was unable to verify a specific dismissal docket entry and date for this case from a primary source. Treat the exact closing event as unconfirmed.

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2. Pre-Trial Motions of Substance

None identified. There is no record of:

• a Rule 12(b) motion to dismiss for improper venue or § 101 unpatentability;
• a § 1404(a) transfer motion;
• a motion to stay pending PTAB or reexamination proceedings;
• any summary judgment motion.

Given the ~125-day lifespan, the case was terminated before the scheduling-order stage at which such motions typically appear in Judge Albright's patent docket. Note that the defendants' deadline to answer (2022-04-21) falls only ~56 days before the likely termination date — so if an answer was ever filed, there is no public record of a substantive response before the case closed.

Contrast: In a companion CommWorks case against Comcast (No. 6:21-cv-00366, also Judge Albright), the court entered an order granting a motion to dismiss on 2022-07-01 (Doc. 50), reported to the USPTO via AO 120 on 2022-07-07 — the same mid-2022 window in which the Charter case terminated.

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3. Claim Construction (Markman)

Did not occur. The case did not reach the Markman stage. For context on what would have been disputed, CommWorks' later pleadings against other defendants identify the recurring '249 claim terms likely to be central — particularly "quality of service event" (specification defines it broadly at col. 10:6–13 as "any event that effects the quality of service," with examples including error seconds, unavailable seconds, packet loss rate, latency, and jitter), and the cross-layer limitation requiring a network controller to respond to a QoS event at layer N by changing provisioning at a layer less than N. The '249 claims asserted across the campaign were typically claims 11, 38, and 41.

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4. Discovery Milestones

No discovery milestones identified. The case closed well before the Local Patent Rules schedule (typically ~6 months to close of fact discovery in Judge Albright's court) would have generated infringement contentions, invalidity contentions, or a discovery-dispute record. No motions to compel, protective orders, or discovery-dispute orders appear in the available docket.

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5. Trial, Verdict & Post-Trial Motions

None. No trial date, verdict, JMOL, new-trial motion, or fee motion. Given the 125-day duration, no pretrial conference or trial setting was reached.

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6. Final Disposition / Present Posture

Most probable disposition: settlement-driven dismissal. The strongest circumstantial evidence:

• RPX records 125 days in litigation for this matter (filed 2022-02-11 → roughly mid-June 2022), with the terminal outcome not confirmed in the RPX record.
• The Stanford NPE Litigation Database lists the case with a blank termination date — i.e., no adjudicated outcome recorded.
• CommWorks' parallel cable/broadband campaign resolved in a tight cluster in mid-2022: the Altice USA/CSC Holdings declaratory-judgment action (D. Del. 21-cv-1323) shows a Notice of Voluntary Dismissal at D.I. 27, reported to the USPTO on 2022-06-21; and the Comcast case in W.D. Tex. was dismissed by order on 2022-07-01.
• CommWorks' consistent litigation pattern in this portfolio was confidential settlement followed by stipulated dismissal with prejudice, with each party bearing its own fees and costs (see, e.g., the Extreme Networks dismissal order in 6:23-cv-00835 and the CommScope/ARRIS order in 2:23-cv-00510, both of which use the identical "have resolved Plaintiff's claims for relief … with all attorneys' fees, costs … borne by the party incurring same" formulation and make no findings on validity or infringement).

Caveat: I could not confirm the docket entry or date of the Charter termination from a primary source. The metadata supplied in this assignment lists the case as "pending," which may reflect a stale database record rather than live litigation — the RPX 125-day figure and the absence of any post-March 2022 docket activity point strongly against active litigation. No appeal (Federal Circuit or otherwise) is identified.

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7. Parallel PTAB / USPTO Proceedings on the '249 Patent

There was no IPR or PGR on the '249 patent. The parallel USPTO proceeding was an ex parte reexamination:

• 2021-11-22 — Unified Patents filed an ex parte reexamination against the '249 patent (Control No. 90/014,909). Unified was represented by Raghav Bajaj (Haynes and Boone LLP) with in-house counsel Ashraf Fawzy and Michelle Aspen. Source: Unified Patents News & Views.
• 2021-12-23 — The USPTO granted the request, finding substantial new questions of patentability on the challenged claims — roughly one month after filing, and about seven weeks before CommWorks filed suit against Charter.

Effect on the Charter litigation: The ex parte reexam grant is the most likely explanation for the timing and brevity of this case. Reexamination of an asserted patent is a common trigger for a defendant's stay motion and for plaintiff-side reassessment of settlement value; here, the case terminated before either party could litigate a stay. Note also that ex parte reexamination does not stay district court litigation automatically, and no stay motion appears on the docket.

Post-reexam viability: The '249 patent was not knocked out by the reexamination. CommWorks continued asserting it — including claim 11 — in subsequent suits: Extreme Networks (6:23-cv-00835, W.D. Tex., dismissed 2024), CommScope/ARRIS (2:23-cv-00510, E.D. Tex.), Hitron Technologies (6:23-cv-00063, W.D. Tex., voluntarily dismissed 2023-07-05), Broadcom (2:25-cv-02998, C.D. Cal., filed 2025-04-07, alleging infringement of the '249, '285, '596, and '979 patents), NXP USA (7:25-cv-00395, W.D. Tex., voluntarily dismissed with prejudice on 2025-10-31), and EarthLink (2:25-cv-00716, E.D. Tex., filed 2025-07-15). The survival and continued assertion of the '249 claims through 2025 indicates the reexamination ultimately issued a certificate confirming (or only narrowly amending) the challenged claims rather than cancelling them — though I did not retrieve the reexamination certificate itself to confirm its exact scope.

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Summary Table

Principal open item for verification: pull the full PACER docket for 6:22-cv-00156 (entries after Doc. 8) to confirm the terminal document — whether a Rule 41(a) notice of voluntary dismissal, a joint stipulation, or a settlement order — and its filing date.

I'll research press coverage of this case across multiple angles.

Let me search additional angles for actual press coverage.

Press & analyst coverage — CommWorks Solutions, LLC v. Charter Communications, Inc., No. 6:22-cv-00156

Bottom line: there is essentially no press coverage of this specific case. I ran searches on the case caption, the party names ("CommWorks Solutions" + "Charter," "Spectrum Gulf Coast"), the asserted patent number (6,832,249), the docket number, and the settlement/verdict angles. I found no article from Reuters, Bloomberg Law, Law360, Ars Technica, The Verge, Patently-O, EFF Deeplinks, JD Supra, or any broadband/telecom trade outlet that reports on CommWorks v. Charter as a discrete matter — no filing story, no settlement story, no damages figure, and no comment from either party. Given that the suit ran roughly 125 days, never reached a substantive motion or a Markman hearing, and appears to have resolved quietly (see the earlier Key Legal Developments section), that silence is consistent with the case being a routine campaign docket entry rather than a newsworthy event. Everything below is coverage that touches this case only indirectly, and I've labeled it as such rather than padding with generic NPE background.

The closest thing to press treatment of the '249 patent's assertion campaign is Unified Patents' "News & Views" blog, which functions as a hybrid of press release and defensive-analysis commentary because Unified is the entity funding the challenges. Unified Patents reported on 2021-11-24 that it had filed an ex parte reexamination against "U.S. Patent 6,832,249 owned and asserted by CommWorks Solutions, LLC, an NPE and subsidiary of IP Investments Group LLC," describing the patent as "generally directed to multi-layered internet communication systems that allow for control over quality of service and priority of information delivery." Notably for this file, that post lists where the '249 was being asserted — "against Comcast and RCN Telecom," in the Altice USA declaratory judgment action, and previously against "Skybeam, Mediacom, AMG Technology Investment Group, Consolidated Communications Holdings, and Cable One" — and does not mention Charter at all, so the write-up predates or omits this docket. Unified Patents followed up reporting that the USPTO granted the reexamination on 2021-12-23, "about one month after Unified filed," finding substantial new questions of patentability on the '249 claims. The only place in any published piece where Charter is named as a CommWorks target is Unified's separate post on a different patent: a Unified Patents item dated 2022-07-05 reported that U.S. Patent 7,760,664 "relates to determining and provisioning paths in a network and has been asserted against eight companies, including RCN Telecom Services, LLC and Charter Communications" — with the companion Unified Patents post reporting the 2022-06-10 filing of that reexamination request. That is meaningful background corroboration that Charter was inside the CommWorks campaign, but Unified frames it as portfolio-level statistics about the '664 patent, not as reporting on the Charter litigation.

The one outlet that reported on CommWorks' corporate structure and the Intellectual Ventures question is IPWatchdog, and it did so in a campaign-roundup format rather than as a case story. IPWatchdog reported on 2021-09-22 that Altice USA had filed a "trio of declaratory judgment actions" against "CommWorks Solutions, LLC, DataCloud Techs., LLC, and DigiMedia Tech, LLC," alleging that the IP-Investments-controlled portfolios "have sued or threatened them via parent company Brainbox Innovations, LLC." According to IPWatchdog's account of the filings, "Intellectual Ventures (the transferor of the portfolios) retains a security interest and a backend on any licensing revenue obtained," and Altice alleged the assertions were part of "a broader, coordinated patent assertion campaign driven by Brainbox and Executed through Defendant and its sister LLCs." That is IPWatchdog's characterization of Altice's allegations — a contested pleading, not an adjudicated finding — and the piece concerns the Delaware DJ actions, not the Texas Charter case.

Where accounts diverge: the corporate-parent description is not consistent across outlets. Unified's posts call CommWorks "a subsidiary of IP Investments Group LLC," while IPWatchdog's roundup describes Brainbox Innovations, LLC as the parent entity behind the IP-Investments-controlled vehicles — a discrepancy worth flagging for the file (the earlier sections of this summary relied on Rule 7.1 disclosures naming Brainbox). I also want to flag two misattribution risks I encountered and deliberately did not lean on: a Lexology post from the Georgia IP Litigation blog on 2022-07-29 discusses an IPInvestments Group affiliate suing Mediacom and refers to "CommWorks Solutions" as an affiliate of Georgia-based NPE IPInvestments Group LLC, but the case it reports on is DigiMedia Tech, LLC v. Mediacom (N.D. Ga.) — a different plaintiff asserting different patents ('818, '568, '980, '778) acquired from Intellectual Ventures. It is not coverage of this Charter case. Similarly, searches surfaced large volumes of unrelated Charter Communications litigation press (the Sony v. Cox-adjacent music-piracy discovery dispute, California wage-and-hour arbitration appeals, Touchstream Technologies v. Charter) — none of that involves CommWorks, and I've excluded it.

Caveat on scope: I could not reach paywalled Law360/Bloomberg Law archives or run unrestricted queries within my search budget, so I cannot rule out a short docket-item blurb in a subscription patent-litigation service (Law360's "Patent Litigation" daily dockets or Bloomberg Law's litigation tracker sometimes note filings and dismissals of this size without a standalone article). Based on open-web sources, however, the honest summary is that this case generated no independent press coverage, and no reported damages figure, settlement term, or party statement exists in any article I located. The only press-adjacent sources that document Charter's involvement in the CommWorks campaign are third-party defensive-blogging posts by an interested party (Unified Patents) and a campaign roundup by IPWatchdog.

Sources

• Charter Communications, Inc. - Charter Communications, Inc.
• Spectrum Gulf Coast, LLC
• CommWorks Solutions, LLC
• 6:22-cv-00156 | CommWorks Solutions, LLC v. Charter Communications, Inc. et al | RPX Insight
• 38. CommWorks or its predecessors-in-interest have satisfied all statutory obligations required to collect pre-filing damages fo...
• CommWorks Solutions, LLC v. Charter Communications, Inc. et al
• CommWorks Solutions, LLC v. Charter Communications, Inc. et al - This case was last updated from U
• AO 120 (Rev
• CommWorks Solutions, LLC
• 7760664 | NPE Litigation Database
• of relevance is immaterial to whether they have waived work product protection
• March 2016 until July 5, 2018. Plaintiffs assert the following claims against Defendant on behalf of themselves and others

I'll research plaintiff-side counsel for this case, starting with the docket and firm sources.

Let me dig into the specific attorney names and their firms.

Now let me confirm the complaint's signature block and the individual attorneys' current firms.

Counsel of Record for Plaintiff CommWorks Solutions, LLC — No. 6:22-cv-00156 (W.D. Tex.)

Caveat up front: The publicly available docket for this case is stale — Justia and UniCourt both reflect a last retrieval of March 10, 2022 (Justia) / April 12, 2022 (UniCourt), and neither shows any filing after Doc. 8 (the 2022-02-15 agreed extension). The plaintiff-side roster below therefore rests on (a) the two docketed appearances I could verify (Docs. 1, 4, 7) and (b) the ECF "attorneys to be noticed"/party-listing fields captured by Justia and UniCourt before the docket went stale. No pro hac vice motions, withdrawal notices, or substitutions appear in the retrieved record, so I cannot rule out that additional appearances were filed after March 2022 and are not captured here.

Verified appearances of record (docket-anchored)

Experience note: Davis and Bartles are frequent Texas local counsel for patent plaintiffs, appearing together in KT Imaging USA v. HP, Freedom Patents LLC v. ON Semiconductor / Tsinghua Tongfang, American Patents LLC v. Telit / Renesas, Textile Computer Systems v. Regions Bank (W.D. Tex., Judge Albright), and Mullen Industries v. Apple / Meta (W.D. Tex.). The firm's Tyler address is used as the Texas local-counsel address of record across those dockets.

Counsel listed on the ECF party record (not separately docketed in the retrieved entries)

Justia's "Represented By" field and UniCourt's attorney list for this case both identify the same four additional plaintiff-side names. These are the Kheyfits Belenky LLP team; the firm's Austin and New York addresses appear in CommWorks' complaints filed in the same campaign window (see the docket-alarm PDF of the Comcast case signature block, which lists the identical firm/attorney lineup):

Firm background note: Kheyfits Belenky LLP (which appears as "KBL" in ECF filings and uses the kblit.com domain) is the patent-monetization boutique that has served as regular outside counsel to CommWorks Solutions and its affiliate IPInvestments Group (a Georgia-based NPE; CommWorks itself is a Georgia LLC with a registered office in Alpharetta). The firm's addresses moved over time (Austin/NY in 2021–22; later San Francisco and 1140 Avenue of the Americas, NY).

Points to flag for the file

1. No in-house counsel identified. CommWorks is an NPE without a disclosed in-house legal department in these filings; IPInvestments Group personnel do not appear as counsel of record.
2. No appearance by the defendant-side team is relevant here, but for completeness the only defense attorney visible on the retrieved docket is Deron R. Dacus (The Dacus Firm, PC, Tyler, TX) as Texas local counsel for Charter/Spectrum (Doc. 8). The Comcast parallel case shows Dacus paired with Farella Braun + Martel LLP (James L. Day, Eugene Y. Mar, San Francisco) on the defense side — but I found no evidence that Farella or any other defense firm entered this Charter case before the docket went stale. Do not assume the defense team was identical.
3. Verification gap: Because the aggregator dockets were captured only through March/April 2022, I cannot confirm (a) whether any Kheyfits Belenky attorney filed a formal pro hac vice motion in this case, or (b) whether counsel withdrew in connection with the case's termination. Pulling the PACER docket for entries after Doc. 8 would resolve both — this is the same open item flagged in the Key Legal Developments section above.
4. Cross-reference to prior section: This section confirms and firms up the attorney names listed in §1 of the earlier summary (which cited the same Justia/UniCourt records) and adds the firm attributions and verified docket-entry anchors (Docs. 1, 4, 7, 8) that were not previously specified. No contradiction with the earlier section was found; the earlier section's caution that the docket is stale remains the operative limitation.

I'll research the defense-side counsel of record through dockets, firm sites, and legal news.

Let me pull the RECAP/CourtListener docket and check Deron Dacus's role, plus Charter's typical patent-defense counsel.

Dacus appears to be the only defense-side entry so far. Let me check whether later filings (answer/appearance) named lead counsel, and look at the parallel CommWorks campaign for defense-firm patterns.

Counsel of Record — Defendants Charter Communications, Inc. & Spectrum Gulf Coast, LLC

Bottom line

Only one defense-side attorney is identifiable from any public record of this docket: Deron R. Dacus of The Dacus Firm, P.C. (Tyler, Texas), who filed the sole defense filing that appears in the retrievable docket — the Notice of Agreed Extension of Time to Answer, Move or Otherwise Respond to Complaint (Doc. 8, entered 2022-02-15) — expressly on behalf of both Charter Communications, Inc. and Spectrum Gulf Coast, LLC. Every free aggregator (Justia, UniCourt, RPX) lists him as the only "Defendant Attorney." No lead counsel, no pro hac vice counsel, and no in-house counsel are verifiable from public sources, and I will not guess at them.

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1. Verified counsel of record

Source: Justia docket – 6:22-cv-00156 (Doc. 8 text and "Represented By" field); UniCourt ("Defendant Attorney: Deron R Dacus"); Dacus firm/bar identification corroborated across multiple CourtListener RECAP filings (e.g., Ravgen v. Natera, W.D. Tex. 6:20-cv-00974, Doc. 70; Stratasys v. Shenzhen Tuozhu, E.D. Tex. 2:24-cv-00645, Doc. 17).

Important correction to the prior section: the earlier draft referred to Dacus as "local counsel" — that is the correct functional characterization, but the docket does not use that label, and it is worth being precise that he is the only attorney who has entered an appearance for the defense in any retrievable record. The prior section's statement that the docket "neither reflects any answer, counterclaim, or motion to dismiss" is confirmed — and, notably, it also reflects no additional attorney appearances.

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2. What the record does not show (stated explicitly, per instructions)

• No lead trial counsel / no national patent-defense firm of record. No pro hac vice motion, no notice of appearance, and no answer signature block naming out-of-state defense counsel is visible in the publicly retrievable docket. The Justia docket was last retrieved 2022-03-10 and UniCourt 2022-04-12 — both before the reset answer deadline of 2022-04-21.
• No in-house counsel identified. Charter maintains an in-house IP/legal department, but I found no verified in-house attorney appearance or signature in this matter.
• No corporate/firm disclosure (Rule 7.1) from the defense appears in the retrievable record — only Plaintiff's (Doc. 4).

Why the gap is material to your question: the case ran only ~125 days (per RPX) and appears to have terminated in roughly mid-June 2022 — i.e., about 6–8 weeks after the answer deadline. It is therefore entirely possible that an answer and one or more pro hac vice appearances were filed between 2022-04-21 and termination and simply were never captured by the free aggregators (which stopped scraping in March/April 2022). Do not treat the absence of lead counsel as proof that none appeared.

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3. Situational evidence (clearly labeled as inference, not record fact)

1. Same local counsel pattern in the companion CommWorks campaign. In CommWorks v. Comcast (E.D. Tex. 2:21-cv-00459; and the W.D. Tex. counterpart 6:21-cv-00366), the same Deron R. Dacus filed the defendants' extension notices (Doc. 13, Doc. 11). That is consistent with CommWorks' campaign defendants uniformly retaining Dacus as the Texas counsel of record while national counsel worked the merits — but I could not retrieve who that national counsel was in the Charter matter.
2. Charter's broader defense lineup (different cases, for context only). In the related Touchstream Technologies v. Charter litigation (E.D. Tex. 2:23-cv-00059), docket entries show Charter entities (including Spectrum Gulf Coast, LLC) represented by Daniel Reisner; and in a 2026 E.D. Tex. matter, Matthias A. Kamber (Paul Hastings LLP, San Francisco) entered an appearance for a slate of Charter/Spectrum entities including Spectrum Gulf Coast. These do not establish counsel in 6:22-cv-00156 — I flag them only as the kind of firms Charter uses, and the Reisner entry's firm affiliation is not confirmed by the snippet I retrieved.
3. Plaintiff-side counsel (for completeness / to avoid confusion). Stafford Grigsby Helm Davis, Catherine Bartles, Andrey Belenky, Dmitry Kheyfits, and Brandon Moore appear for CommWorks (per Justia/UniCourt), consistent with the prior section. These are not defense counsel.

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4. Verification checklist (to close the gap definitively)

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Summary: The one confirmed attorney of record for the Charter/Spectrum Gulf Coast defense is Deron R. Dacus, The Dacus Firm, P.C. (Tyler, TX) — functionally local counsel, appearing for both defendants on Doc. 8. No other defense counsel can be verified from public sources; the docket snapshots end pre-answer, so any lead/pro hac vice counsel who appeared after 2022-04-21 would not appear in the free records I can access. I have not invented any names to fill that gap.