CommWorks Solutions, LLC v. CommScope Holding Co., Inc. et al.

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

Let me dig deeper into the parties, PTAB challenges, and docket specifics.

Let me verify the docket timeline and check for PTAB/reexam challenges to the asserted patents.

Case Overview and Background

The parties. Plaintiff CommWorks Solutions, LLC is a Georgia limited liability company with a registered office in Alpharetta (Fulton County), Georgia. It is not an operating company: it makes no products, and in this case it affirmatively disclosed Brainbox Innovations, LLC as its corporate parent in its Rule 7.1 disclosure statement (2:23-cv-00510, Dkt. 1, Nov. 3, 2023; Rule 7.1 disclosure). That places it squarely within the IP Investments Group / Brainbox family of Georgia LLCs that took in thousands of patents divested by Intellectual Ventures (IV) in late 2019–2020 — a lineage confirmed by RPX, Law Street/the IP Crew, and the Stanford NPE Litigation Database (CommWorks appears as the "Patent Asserter" in ~a dozen actions). Reporting on CommWorks' own pleadings identifies it as "an affiliate of Georgia-based NPE IPInvestments Group" (Lexology, July 29, 2022; IPWatchdog, June 3, 2020, tagging CommWorks as [IP Investments Group]). One caveat worth flagging: in Altice USA, Inc. v. CommWorks Solutions, LLC, No. 1:21-cv-01323 (D. Del. Sept. 17, 2021), Altice alleged (as an allegation, not an established finding) that IV retained a security interest in and a "backend" on licensing revenue from these portfolios. The defendants — CommScope Holding Company, Inc.; CommScope, Inc.; CommScope Technologies LLC; and ARRIS US Holdings, Inc., ARRIS Solutions, Inc., ARRIS Technology, Inc., ARRIS Enterprises LLC — are all operating companies in the CommScope corporate family (Hickory, N.C.), which acquired ARRIS International plc in 2019 in a widely reported ~$7.4 billion transaction that brought the ARRIS broadband CPE/home-networks business in-house. The named ARRIS entities are the group's U.S. operating/sales vehicles for the accused hardware.

Accused products and asserted patents. The complaint attacked two product categories: (1) GPON/XGS-PON optical line terminals, exemplified by the CommScope XP6164S FLX OLT (carrier-side broadband access gear), and (2) Wi-Fi-enabled routers, gateways and access points, exemplified by the ARRIS NVG468MQ Gateway (the consumer-premises gateway widely deployed by telcos such as Frontier) — with RPX recording roughly 82 accused products overall. The infringement theories map onto standardized, Wi-Fi Alliance–certified features rather than bespoke implementations: WPS push-button provisioning and WMM/802.11e quality-of-service prioritization, plus PON-layer QoS monitoring. The case metadata provided to me lists only one patent — U.S. Patent No. 6,891,807 ("Time Based Wireless Access Provisioning," issued May 10, 2005; inventors Roskind & Robinson; originally assigned to America Online, Inc.) — but the complaint as filed, per RPX and PatSnap case records, asserted seven patents: the '807 and its time-based-provisioning family members 7,177,285, 7,463,596 and 7,911,979 (access point tracks a wireless device's power-on or signal-transmission onset and provisions it only if that event falls in an "activatable time interval" — functionally the WPS button-push window); 7,027,465 and reissue RE44,904, both "Method for Contention Free Traffic Detection" (extract a bit pattern at a fixed offset in a frame, compare to a search pattern, and flag/queue the frame as priority traffic without parsing upper-layer protocols — the WMM QoS hook); and 6,832,249, "Globally accessible computer network-based broadband communication system with user-controllable quality of information delivery and flow priority" (multi-layer OSI network with a monitor that detects a QoS event at layer N and reprovisions at a lower layer — the OLT hook). CommWorks charted at least claim 17 of the '807, claim 46 of the '249, and claim 7 of the RE'904 against those accused devices.

Posture, venue, and why the case matters. Filed November 3, 2023 in the E.D. Tex. Marshall Division before Chief Judge Rodney Gilstrap (Gilstrap is long one of the district's highest-volume patent judges, and Marshall Division practice — speed to trial, local patent rules, and a large NPE docket — is a core reason plaintiffs file there); the docket shows appearances by CommWorks' counsel (Kheyfits Belenky LLP and The Stafford Davis Firm), an unopposed extension of the answer deadline granted Nov. 28, 2023 (Dkt. 11), and a scheduling/case-management conference set for Jan. 18, 2024 (Dkt. 12, Dec. 13, 2023), with Findlay Craft PC appearing for the defendants. The case ended not on the merits but by joint motion to dismiss (Dkt. 40): the parties represented they "have resolved Plaintiff's claims for relief," and the Court dismissed all claims with prejudice, each side bearing its own fees and costs — a record consistent with PatSnap's case data (closed May 24, 2024, ~203 days after filing). That posture is the story. First, the asserted patents are expired — CommWorks' own pleadings in this campaign plead induced and contributory infringement "from April 2020 until the '807 patent's expiry," and the nominal 20-year terms (the '249 patent from a Feb. 2001 filing; the '807/'285/'596/'979 family measured from the Jan. 13, 2003 '807 filing) ran out between roughly February 2021 and January 2023, leaving a past-damages-only claim (my own term computations, excluding any patent term adjustment — I did not verify expiry dates on the USPTO register in this research). Second, because the asserted claims read on mandatory Wi-Fi Alliance certification behaviors (WPS, WMM), the portfolio is not really aimed at CommScope's products but at the entire Wi-Fi/CPE supply chain; CommWorks had already sued the same product ecosystem's customers (Charter, Comcast, Cable One, Mediacom, RCN, Consolidated Communications, Mediacom) and chipmakers (MediaTek, Qualcomm, Broadcom/ST-focused counts, Texas Instruments, u-blox, D-Link, Technicolor, TRENDnet), and this suit is the supplier-side escalation. Third, there is real PTAB/validity-challenge linkage: Unified Patents ran a parallel campaign against this exact portfolio — its ex parte reexamination of the '249 patent was granted Dec. 23, 2021, and on Feb. 13, 2023 the PTAB issued a final written decision in Unified Patents, LLC v. CommWorks Solutions, LLC holding all challenged claims of U.S. Patent 8,923,846 unpatentable — and Altice's Delaware declaratory-judgment action (asserting the '249, '807, '285, '596 and '979 patents) was voluntarily dismissed in June 2022. The CommScope case nonetheless produced no claim construction, no invalidity ruling, and no IPR on the '807 patent that I could locate, which is precisely the pattern this campaign repeats: fast, with-prejudice settlements that leave every patent at full presumptive strength (compare CommWorks v. Texas Instruments, dismissed with prejudice ~81 days after filing, and CommWorks v. TRENDnet, ~259 days).

Sourcing caveats: the dismissal-order date (≈May 24, 2024) and the docket-entry-level timeline come from PatSnap/RPX case records and a CourtListener/UniCourt docket snapshot rather than a fresh PACER pull in this session; RPX lists "76 days in litigation" for this case, which is inconsistent with the Nov. 3, 2023–May 24, 2024 span recorded elsewhere and should be treated as an RPX data artifact; the "IP Investments Group / Brainbox" characterization rests on party reporting (IPWatchdog, RPX, Law Street, Stanford NPE Database) and CommWorks' own Rule 7.1 disclosure, and the IV security-interest point is an allegation in Altice's complaint, not an adjudicated fact.

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

Let me pull the full docket and look for parallel PTAB proceedings.

Let me get the full docket and check PTAB proceedings on the asserted patents.

Key Legal Developments — CommWorks Solutions, LLC v. CommScope Holding Co., Inc., No. 2:23-cv-00510 (E.D. Tex.)

Framework note on the record: This case ran filed 2023-11-03 → closed 2024-05-24 (≈203 days) and terminated on a joint motion to dismiss with prejudice. There was no Markman hearing, no dispositive-motion practice, no expert phase, no trial, and no appeal. The chronology below therefore covers the pleading stage, the scheduling track, and the termination event. A caveat on sourcing up front: the free dockets I could retrieve (Justia, UniCourt, PatSnap/Eureka, RPX Insight) fully expose entries 1–12 and the termination filings (Dkt. 40 + order), but not docket entries ~13–39. I flag below where I am inferring from the absence of reported activity rather than from a retrieved docket line. (Justia docket; RPX Insight; PatSnap case record)

A note on the "patent at issue" in the case metadata: the metadata lists only U.S. Patent No. 6,891,807. That is accurate but incomplete — the complaint asserted seven patents: U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,832,249; 6,891,807; 7,027,465; 7,177,285; 7,463,596; 7,911,979; and RE44,904. The '807 (WPS/time-based provisioning) was one of the asserted patents, not the sole one. This matters because the partial release in the 2024 dismissal is measured against all seven. (Complaint docket entry, Dkt. 1; Ex Parte complaint analysis)

1. Filing and initial pleadings

• 2023-11-03 — Complaint filed (Dkt. 1). CommWorks sued CommScope Holding Co., CommScope, Inc., CommScope Technologies LLC, ARRIS US Holdings, Inc., ARRIS Solutions, Inc., ARRIS Technology, Inc., and ARRIS Enterprises LLC in the Marshall Division, assigned to Chief Judge Rodney Gilstrap. Causes of action: direct infringement (35 U.S.C. § 271(a)), induced and contributory infringement, and willfulness as to each patent; jury demand; request for enhanced damages under § 284 and fees under § 285. Summons issued the same day (Dkt. 2). (Justia docket)
• Accused products (two clusters): (1) carrier optical gear — G-PON/XGS-PON systems exemplified by the CommScope XP6164S FLX Optical Line Terminal (mapped to the '249 cross-layer QoS patent); and (2) CPE Wi-Fi gear — exemplified by the ARRIS NVG468MQ Gateway, accused of infringing the WPS-family patents ('807, '285, '596, '979) and the WMM/QoS-detection patents ('465, RE44,904) via standardized Wi-Fi Protected Setup and Wi-Fi Multimedia functionality. (Ex Parte complaint analysis)
• Pre-suit notice pleadings (the willfulness predicate). The complaint tied defendants' knowledge to CommWorks's earlier campaign: the 2020-05-27 suit against Cable One and the 2020-09-14 suit against RCN (in which ARRIS products were identified as accused instrumentalities), plus subpoenas served on ARRIS US Holdings, Inc. issued 2021-05-28 (delivered 2021-06-01) and a second subpoena issued 2022-01-05 directed at the accused functionality. The complaint further alleged a policy/practice of not reviewing third-party patents as willful blindness. (Complaint timeline reproduced in Ex Parte analysis)
• 2023-11-06/07 — Rule 7.1 disclosures and appearances (Dkts. 3–9). Entry of appearance by Andrey Belenky, Dmitry Kheyfits, Brandon Gregory Moore, Catherine Susan Bartles (Kheyfits Belenky LLP) and Stafford Grigsby Helm Davis (The Stafford Davis Firm, Tyler); the corporate-parent disclosure identified Brainbox Innovations, LLC as CommWorks's parent. (UniCourt docket)
• Defense counsel of record appears to have been Findlay Craft PC (Eric H. Findlay; Roger Brian Craft) — the same Tyler firm that represented the CommScope/ARRIS entities in the parallel TQ Delta litigation. (PatSnap counsel table; cf. TQ Delta v. CommScope filings)
• 2023-11-27 — Unopposed motion to extend time to answer (Dkt. 10); granted 2023-11-28 (Dkt. 11). (UniCourt docket)
• Answers/counterclaims: I could not retrieve a docket line confirming the filing of an answer with invalidity/non-infringement counterclaims, though defensives of that kind are standard and would have been due after the extension. The termination order's "all pending requests for relief… DENIED AS MOOT" language, and the dismissal's silence on fee-shifting beyond "each party bears its own," is consistent with an answer and counterclaims having been on file. Treat the answer/counterclaim details as unverified.

2. Scheduling and the absence of substantive pre-trial motion practice

• 2023-12-13 — Dkt. 12: Order setting a Scheduling/Case Management Conference for 2024-01-18 before Judge Gilstrap. (UniCourt docket)
• No motion to dismiss, motion to transfer venue, motion to stay pending IPR, or motion for summary judgment appears in any of the litigation databases I searched (RPX, PatSnap/Eureka, Docket Alarm, Stanford NPE). The case never reached claim construction. This is the single most important structural fact about the case: it was resolved before the first substantive contested milestone. In E.D. Tex., a Gilstrap docket-control order in a 2024-filed case would typically set a Markman hearing many months out; nothing in the record reflects one being held or briefed. Inference, clearly labeled: the absence of any reported opinion, order, or hearing on claim construction, venue, or validity across multiple commercial and academic trackers supports the conclusion that none occurred.
• Practical driver worth noting: the complaint's damages theory for the WPS/provisioning family ran only "from April 2020 until the '807 patent's expiry," and CommWorks's own Patsnap bibliographic data lists the contention-free-traffic-detection patent (the '465/reissue family) with an estimated expiry of 2021-02-22. In other words, much of the asserted portfolio was at or near the end of its statutory term when suit was filed, sharply compressing the recoverable damages window. That is a plausible — but not documented — reason both sides chose an early, confidential resolution. (PatSnap patent fields)

3. Claim construction

None reached. No Markman order, hearing transcript, or joint claim construction statement is reported for 2:23-cv-00510. The complaint itself previewed the constructions that would have mattered had the case survived — for example, "quality of service event" in the '249 patent (specification examples are latency/jitter/packet loss, against an accused "Start-up failure"/CRC event on the PLOAM channel) and "activatable provisioning time interval" in the '807 patent (against the standardized 120-second WPS "walk time"). Those disputes never got a judicial answer, which is why the seven patents emerged from this case with no claim-scope precedent attached. (Ex Parte claim-term analysis)

4. Discovery

No discovery milestone is documented. The only discovery-adjacent facts of record are the 2021 and 2022 pre-suit third-party subpoenas to ARRIS US Holdings described in the complaint, which CommWorks used to establish knowledge and to develop its infringement theories before naming the CommScope/ARRIS entities directly. Given a ~6.5-month life and a dismissal before the scheduling order matured, no meaningful merits discovery (no expert reports, no claim-construction discovery) is reflected. (Complaint timeline)

5. Trial, verdict, post-trial motions

None. No trial setting, no verdict, no JMOL/Rule 59 motion, and no § 285 fee motion. The case was disposed of 203 days after filing, well before any of those stages.

6. Final disposition — joint dismissal with prejudice

• Dkt. 40 — Joint Motion to Dismiss, filed by CommWorks and all seven defendants, representing that the parties "have resolved Plaintiff's claims for relief against Defendants asserted in this case" and requesting dismissal with prejudice, each side bearing its own fees, costs, and expenses.
• Order granting the motion (case closed 2024-05-24). The court's text (quoted verbatim in PatSnap's case record): all pending claims DISMISSED WITH PREJUDICE; "[a]ll attorneys' fees, costs of court, and expenses shall be borne by the party incurring the same"; "[a]ll pending requests for relief between the Parties… not explicitly granted herein are DENIED AS MOOT." (PatSnap order text)
• Legal effect: a with-prejudice dismissal operates as a final adjudication and bars CommWorks from re-asserting these seven patents against the CommScope/ARRIS defendants on the same accused products. It is not an adjudication of validity or infringement, and neither side made any admission. The resolution language — "resolved… claims for relief" — is the standard neutral formulation used to paper a confidential license/settlement, the terms of which are not on the public record. No license, royalty rate, or payment amount has been disclosed. (PatSnap analysis)
• Appeal: none docketed; there is no Federal Circuit activity on this case number in my searches.

Minor data discrepancy to be aware of: RPX Insight reports "76 days in litigation" for this docket, which is inconsistent with the 2023-11-03 → 2024-05-24 span (≈203 days) reported by PatSnap and reflected in the docket. RPX's figure appears stale or computed on a different event pair (e.g., filing to the 2024-01-18 scheduling conference). Use 203 days as the operative duration.

7. Parallel PTAB proceedings on the asserted patents

• I did not locate any IPR, PGR, or reissue/reexam challenge at the PTAB directed at the seven patents-in-suit that arose from or ran parallel to this case. CommWorks's own Patsnap record for the '465/reissue family lists "validity challenges: None recorded," and no CommScope/ARRIS-authored PTAB petition against the '465, '807, '285, '596, '979, '249, or RE44,904 surfaced in searches. (For contrast, the same defendants did litigate and petition heavily in E.D. Tex. against TQ Delta — e.g., IPR2022-00640, Nokia v. TQ Delta — showing sophisticated PTAB usage available to them here.) (PatSnap)
• Consequence: because there was no IPR and no district-court validity ruling, the asserted claims retain their presumptive validity and no estoppel attaches. No motion to stay pending IPR was needed or filed, which is consistent with the absence of any stay motion in the docket.
• Caveat: I could not run a full PTAB docket sweep, so if an IPR on one of these patents exists, I have not verified it. Treat "no parallel PTAB proceeding" as well-supported but not exhaustively confirmed.

8. Strategic context (brief, since the prior sections cover the case)

This docket was one node in a portfolio-wide CommWorks licensing campaign asserting substantially the same patent set against WMM/WPS implementers and service providers — including Cable One (2:20-cv-00159), RCN (S.D.N.Y. 1:20-cv-07534), Zyxel, Ubee, TRENDnet (C.D. Cal. 2:23-cv-08048), DrayTek (2:25-cv-00024), AVM (2:25-cv-00026), EarthLink (2:25-cv-00716), Texas Instruments (2:25-cv-00439), and Renesas (2:25-cv-01257) — nearly all of which also ended in with-prejudice or stipulated dismissals without merits rulings. CommScope/ARRIS was the earliest big-ticket infrastructure defendant to settle out, and the with-prejudice dismissal here released only these seven defendants, leaving the patents live against everyone else. (Stanford NPE Litigation Database, '807; Ex Parte CommWorks party page)

Bottom line

Legally, this is a short, settlement-terminated NPE case with essentially no contested law on the record: complaint and summons (2023-11-03), brief pleading-stage extensions, a scheduling conference set for 2024-01-18, and a joint dismissal with prejudice on 2024-05-24 (Dkt. 40) with mutual cost-bearing and no merits adjudication, no claim construction, no IPR, no trial, and no appeal. The only verifiable "legal developments" of substance are (a) the scope of the release — seven patents, seven CommScope/ARRIS entities; and (b) the res judicata/finality effect of the with-prejudice dismissal, which permanently closed this patent set against these defendants while leaving it enforceable against the rest of the Wi-Fi/CPE market.

I'll search for press coverage of this case from multiple angles.

Let me retrieve the specific IPWatchdog article listed and search other press angles.

The listed IPWatchdog article predates this case's Nov. 2023 filing — let me check what it actually reports and search for other coverage.

*Bottom line: I found no press coverage of CommWorks Solutions, LLC v. CommScope Holding Co., Inc., No. 2:23-cv-00510, itself.* No Reuters, Bloomberg Law, Law360, Ars Technica, The Verge, Patently-O, EFF, JD Supra, broadcast/telecom-trade, or local-news article about this docket surfaced in my searches. The only records of this case I could retrieve are litigation-data aggregators rather than journalism — PatSnap/Eureka, RPX Insight, Justia Dockets, UniCourt, and Ex Parte's AI-generated complaint analysis. None of those is a news outlet, and none reports a damages figure, settlement amount, or executive or industry statement — consistent with the earlier sections' conclusion that the case ended by confidential joint dismissal with prejudice (Dkt. 40) and that no terms were disclosed.

The one indexed article that touches this patent family is the IPWatchdog roundup, and it is materially different from what the citation implies. The listed item, IPWatchdog, published 2022-07-29, reports the week's nationwide docket totals (63 new district court patent filings, 71 terminations, 34 PTAB filings — one PGR and 33 IPRs), analyzes the Western District of Texas's new practice of randomly distributing new Waco cases "on the wheel," and notes the WSOU/Microsoft dismissals. It does not mention CommScope or ARRIS anywhere, and it predates the Nov. 3, 2023 filing of this case by roughly 15 months — so it cannot be a report on 2:23-cv-00510. What its filing table does show is CommWorks' sibling campaign filings from that same July 2022 week: CommWorks Solutions LLC [tagged "IP Investments Group"] v. Technicolor USA Inc., No. 1:22-cv-02827, asserting 6,891,807; 7,463,596; RE44,904; 7,911,979; 7,027,465; and 7,177,285 — six of the seven patents later asserted here — and CommWorks Solutions LLC [IP Investments Group] v. D-Link Corp., No. 6:22-cv-00806, asserting the '807. So the article is best read as contemporaneous corroboration of the earlier sections' characterization of this campaign (the IP Investments Group NPE lineage; the same standardized WPS/WMM-oriented patent set aimed across the CPE/router supply chain) rather than as coverage of the CommScope case.

Flagged discrepancy with the task framing. The premise that this article is "about this case" is not supported: the metadata I must treat as authoritative places the filing at 2023-11-03, and the article is dated 2022-07-29. I found no CommWorks v. CommScope filing from mid-2022, so I cannot reconcile the citation on that basis. If an earlier CommWorks–CommScope docket exists that I did not locate, this article still does not reference CommScope or ARRIS by name in any text I could retrieve. Treat the roundup as industry-roundup context on the CommWorks portfolio, not as reporting on this docket — and note that the "IP Investments Group" tag in that table is press-side support for the NPE-lineage point the earlier sections sourced to IPWatchdog, RPX, Law Street, and CommWorks' own Rule 7.1 disclosure.

Where reporting "goes beyond" the court record: nowhere, for this case. The only commentary I found that interprets the dismissal — e.g., PatSnap's statement that the neutral "have resolved Plaintiff's claims for relief" language is "consistent with a confidential license or settlement," and its res judicata analysis — is machine-generated litigation-analysis commentary, not journalism, and it is squarely derived from the Dkt. 40 order text it quotes. There are no analyst takes, executive statements, or industry reactions about this case in the press record I could locate. Two secondary items are worth distinguishing so they are not mistaken for coverage of this case: the W.D. Tex. Comcast case-readiness report (a court filing in CommWorks v. Comcast, 6:21-cv-00366) and the Unified Patents IPR2021-01297 exhibit in the '846 patent challenge — neither is press coverage, and neither concerns the CommScope docket.

Sources

• CommWorks v. CommScope: 7-Patent Optical Network Dispute | PatSnap - Your Agentic AI Partner
• CommWorks Solutions v. CommScope et al. | Patent Lawsuit 2:23-cv-00510 - CommWorks Solutions, LLC v. CommScope Holding Company, Inc. et al.
• Cases
• CommWorks Solutions, LLC v. CommScope Holding Company, Inc. et al - This case was last updated from U
• 2:23-cv-00510 | CommWorks Solutions LLC v. CommScope Holding Co Inc | Ex Parte
• AO 120 (Rev
• IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE WESTERN DISTRICT OF TEXAS WACO DIVISION
• Cases
• IN THE UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
• Arris Solutions Inc | Ex Parte
• Litigation Archives - Posts in Litigation
• Patents Archives - Posts in Patents

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

Let me investigate each named plaintiff attorney and the firms involved.

Let me pull the actual complaint signature block and docket sheet for this case.

Plaintiff's counsel of record — CommWorks Solutions, LLC v. CommScope Holding Co., et al., No. 2:23-cv-00510 (E.D. Tex.)

Sources used: the docket as reported by Justia Dockets (docket no. 225948) and UniCourt's docket mirror for case 2:23-cv-00510; PACER-derived counsel/firm data reproduced by PatSnap Eureka and RPX Insight; firm/attorney records via CourtListener party pages, Docket Alarm filings, Law360 firm pages, and Super Lawyers. Because the case was dismissed with prejudice on joint motion (Dkt. 40; order at Dkt. 41, May 24, 2024) before any merits or claim-construction activity, there is no opinion naming "lead trial counsel," and the E.D. Tex. docket never reached a formal lead-counsel designation under L.R. CV-11. Role labels below are therefore inferred from who signed what, not from a court order.

Appearances on the docket

Things worth flagging

• The PACER name is a single person, not a firm. "Stafford Grigsby Helm Davis" is the plaintiff's complaint signer; Law360's firm page renders him with the full name, while Super Lawyers lists him as Stafford G. Davis of The Stafford Davis Firm, PC (Tyler). Some aggregators (PatSnap) split the entry into "Stafford Grigsby Helm Davis" (attorney) and "Stafford Davis Firm PC" (firm) — that is the same lawyer.
• Two-firm structure. The public record shows a Texas-local firm (Stafford Davis Firm, Tyler) plus an out-of-state patent boutique (Kheyfits Belenky LLP), which is the standard E.D. Tex. configuration: boutique handles the patent case, Tyler firm supplies the local signature and address.
• No in-house counsel appeared. No notice of appearance was filed on behalf of CommWorks' corporate parent or owner. Separately, CommWorks' corporate parent is Brainbox Innovations, LLC, disclosed in its Rule 7.1 statement (Dkt. 7) — relevant background for the plaintiff's NPE posture, but no in-house attorney of record is identifiable from the docket.
• Nothing is sealed or missing on the counsel side. Appearances (Dkt. 3, 4, 5, 9) were all made in early November 2023, before the first scheduling order (Dkt. 12, setting the Jan. 18, 2024 case-management conference). Because the case ended by joint dismissal with prejudice (Dkt. 40/41) with each side bearing its own fees, there were no further appearances, substitutions, or pro hac vice motions to report.
• Defendant side (context only): Findlay Craft PC (Eric Hugh Findlay, Brian Craft) appears as CommScope's counsel of record — useful if you are cross-referencing the parallel TQ Delta v. CommScope matter, where CommScope's lead-counsel designations were litigated.

Sourcing caveat: The docket entries above are drawn from Justia's and UniCourt's PACER mirrors plus PACER-derived counsel tables (PatSnap/RPX), not from a direct PACER pull of each appearance notice; I could not retrieve the underlying Notice of Appearance PDFs themselves. The one genuinely unverified item is Brandon Gregory Moore's firm affiliation — treat that as open until confirmed against Dkt. 5.

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

Let me verify the defendant-side appearances directly from the docket record.

Let me pull the full docket sheet to verify all defendant-side appearances.

Counsel of Record — Defendants (CommScope / ARRIS entities)

Bottom line: The only attorneys I could identify as appearing for the seven defendant entities in CommWorks Solutions, LLC v. CommScope Holding Co., Inc., No. 2:23-cv-00510 (E.D. Tex.) are Eric Hugh Findlay and Brian Craft of Findlay Craft, P.C. (Tyler, Texas). The docket-derived litigation records list them as the sole defense-side counsel; both are Texas-based, E.D. Tex.–admitted attorneys who function as the defendants' lead and local counsel of record in this District.

---

Sourcing and what is — and isn't — confirmed

What I could verify:

• The case docket itself (Justia's PACER-derived docket sheet for 2:23-cv-00510) shows the plaintiff's appearances (Dkts. 3–5, 9) but the public docket text available to me is truncated after the early filings; it does not expose the defendant-side appearance entries. See https://dockets.justia.com/docket/texas/txedce/2:2023cv00510/225948
• The full docket snapshot (through the 5/24/2024 dismissal) is docket-derived only via third-party aggregators. UniCourt's capture (last updated 1/2/2024) likewise lists only plaintiff-side attorneys (Bartles, Moore, Belenky, Kheyfits, Davis) and cut off at Dkt. 12. See https://unicourt.com/case/pc-db5-casegu6f71d119c074-[1692416](/patent/1692416)
• PatSnap's PACER-derived party/attorney record for this case expressly lists "Eric Hugh Findlay · Roger Brian Craft," firm "Findlay Craft PC," as counsel for CommScope, with the seven CommScope/ARRIS entities noted as co-defendants. See https://www.patsnap.com/resources/blog/litigation/commworks-v-commscope-7-patent-optical-network-dispute-patsnap/
• Findlay Craft's role as the CommScope/ARRIS defendants' E.D. Tex. counsel is independently corroborated by their filings in the companion case against the identical corporate family — e.g., TQ Delta, LLC v. CommScope Holding Co., Inc., No. 2:21-cv-00310-JRG, where Eric H. Findlay and Brian Craft signed CommScope's notices of compliance, venue-transfer briefing, and claim-construction submissions for "CommScope Holding Company, Inc., CommScope, Inc., ARRIS US Holdings, Inc., ARRIS Solutions, Inc., ARRIS Technology, Inc., and ARRIS Enterprises, LLC." (Findlay Craft, 102 N. College Ave., Ste. 900, Tyler, TX 75703; efindlay@findlaycraft.com / bcraft@findlaycraft.com).

What I could not confirm (and will not invent):

1. Trial-level lead counsel from national firms. In the parallel TQ Delta litigation, CommScope/ARRIS used Alston & Bird LLP (e.g., Ross R. Barton, M. Scott Stevens, Kirk T. Bradley, Nicholas C. Marais — Charlotte, NC) as lead trial counsel, with Goodwin Procter LLP (Douglas J. Kline, Andrew S. Ong) originally of record before being replaced. I found no filing evidence that Alston & Bird, Goodwin, or any other national firm entered an appearance in CommWorks v. CommScope (2:23-cv-00510). It is plausible they were retained but never appeared because the case settled before a scheduling order ripened — but I cannot substantiate that, so I am not listing them as counsel of record here.
2. In-house counsel. No in-house CommScope/ARRIS attorney appears in any source I reviewed for this docket.
3. Sealed filings. The case did include sealed activity (the dismissal followed a joint motion at Dkt. 40, and the docket reflects a scheduling conference order at Dkt. 12 and an unopposed extension at Dkts. 10–11). Any sealed appearance notices, pro hac vice applications, or protective-order designations would not be reflected in the public records I could reach.
4. Name discrepancy. Litigation databases render Mr. Craft's name as "Roger Brian Craft," while every court filing he has signed in the related E.D. Tex. matters uses "Brian Craft" (bcraft@findlaycraft.com). Both refer to the same Findlay Craft partner; I flag this so you don't treat it as two different attorneys.

Practical note for your purposes: because the case was dismissed with prejudice on joint motion roughly six and a half months after filing (Nov. 3, 2023 → May 24, 2024) and the accessible public docket is thin, the defense-side appearance record here is best characterized as "counsel identified in the docket-derived record but not fully verifiable against primary PACER docket text." If you need a certified list of counsel of record, a PACER pull of the full docket sheet (or the Dkt. 1–40 filing headers) is the only authoritative source, and I'd recommend ordering it before relying on this list in a filing or client memo.