Delaware Display Group LLC v. Amazon.com Inc.

I'll research this case across docket sources, patent records, and legal press.

Case Overview — Delaware Display Group LLC et al. v. [Amazon.com, Inc.](/litigations/by-plaintiff/Amazon.com%2C%20Inc.), No. 1:13-cv-02106-RGA (D. Del.)

The parties. The real caption is Delaware Display Group LLC et al. v. Amazon.com, Inc. — the "et al." is Innovative Display Technologies LLC ("IDT"), a co-plaintiff the case metadata omits. Both plaintiffs are patent-assertion entities and sister subsidiaries of Acacia Research Corporation (NASDAQ: ACTG); plaintiffs' own Rule 7.1 disclosure (D.I. 5, filed Jan. 2, 2014) identifies "Corporate Parent Acacia Research Group LLC, Other Affiliate Acacia Research Corporation." DDG (a Delaware LLC) and IDT (a Texas LLC) both pleaded a principal place of business at 2400 Dallas Parkway, Suite 200, Plano, Texas (Compl. ¶¶ 1–2); contemporaneous press coverage placed IDT's operating address at 1701 Directors Blvd., Austin, shared with numerous other Acacia shells. Amazon.com, Inc. is the operating defendant — a Delaware corporation headquartered at 410 Terry Ave. N., Seattle. Neither plaintiff makes or sells anything; this is a pure licensing/enforcement vehicle, which is the standard Acacia pattern. The patents themselves trace to a genuine operating company: the "Light Emitting Panel Assemblies" family originated with Lumitex (Cleveland) and its spin-off Solid State Opto Limited, was sold to Rambus (reported at ~$26M by a Taiwanese industry write-up, secondary source — treat as reported, not confirmed), and was then transferred by Rambus to an Acacia subsidiary in March 2013 (Rambus press release, Mar. 7, 2013: "Rambus Transfers Display Patents to Acacia Research Subsidiary"). The named inventor across the family is Jeffery R. Parker. Per the complaint, IDT took assignment of its patents on July 26, 2013, and DDG took the '196 patent on Dec. 20, 2013 (Compl. ¶¶ 19–20).

The technology and the asserted patents. The accused products are Amazon tablets with LCD displays — the complaint names "the Kindle Fire HD" as an exemplary infringing product (Compl. ¶ 22), and pleads infringement by reason of incorporating backlight structures covered by the patents (thinner, longer, brighter, more uniform, lower-power displays). Although the case metadata lists only U.S. 7,404,660, the complaint actually asserted eight patents: seven "IDT patents" — 6,755,547; 7,300,194; 7,384,177; 7,404,660; 7,434,974; 7,537,370; 8,215,816 — all titled "Light Emitting Panel Assemblies" and all sharing parent U.S. 5,613,751 (filed June 27, 1995), plus the DDG-owned 7,914,196, "Light Redirecting Film Systems Having Pattern of Variable Optical Elements." Technically, the '547/'194/'177/'660/'974/'370/'816 group claims edge-lit LCD backlight architecture: a generally planar optical conductor having an input edge "with a greater cross-sectional width than thickness," a plurality of light sources (typically LEDs) generating light whose output distribution has "a greater width component than height component" positioned adjacent that input edge, an output region bearing a patterned field of light-extracting deformities, and a transition region between light source and output region — i.e., the light-guide/mixing-zone structure behind virtually every edge-lit LCD (see illustrative claim 1 as reproduced in the PTAB's institution decision in IPR2015-00487). The '196 patent covers optical films whose pattern of light-redirecting elements varies across the film to shape backlight output.

Procedural posture, venue, and why it matters. Filed Dec. 31, 2013 in the [U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware (Wilmington)](/courts/district-of-delaware-wilmington), the case was assigned to Judge Richard G. Andrews on Jan. 8, 2014, with Magistrate Judge Mary Pat Thynge as referred judge, and it is docketed as a § 271 patent case with a plaintiff jury demand and willfulness allegations. It was one of seven complaints filed the same day — 1:13-cv-02106 through -02112 — against Amazon, HTC, Lenovo, LG (Electronics + LG Display entities), Pantech, Sony, and VIZIO, following IDT's June 2013 E.D. Tex. wave against Dell, HP, Huawei, ZTE, RIM/Acer and others (RPX, Jan. 9, 2014). The venue choice was deliberate and openly pleaded: plaintiffs grounded personal jurisdiction and venue on Amazon's Delaware incorporation, arguing Amazon "has sought protection and benefit from the laws of the State of Delaware by incorporating in the state of Delaware" (Compl. ¶¶ 6, 8). That is a classic pre-TC Heartland (2017) forum play — and notable precisely because it is the practice TC Heartland later curtailed. Two features make this docket worth remembering. First, the case closed quickly: per RPX the matter terminated Sept. 5, 2014 after 249 days, with a final docket entry Sept. 29, 2014 — I could not verify from the sources reviewed whether that was a settlement, a license, or a voluntary dismissal, so treat the cause of dismissal as unsourced. Second, the patents were challenged at the PTAB by the display-panel suppliers rather than by Amazon: IPR2014-01094 (denied institution), IPR2015-00363 (terminated), IPR2015-00495 (LG Electronics, denied July 20, 2015), IPR2015-00487 (LG Display, instituted July 16, 2015), and IPR2015-01717 (LG Electronics, a copy of the '487 petition, joinder granted Feb. 5, 2016, terminated on the '487 final written decision). The '660 patent survived: the July 15, 2016 final written decision in IPR2015-00487 found no claims unpatentable, and RPX records a Federal Circuit appeal at No. 2017-1413 (outcome not verified here). That victory was largely pyrrhic, however: as patent owner itself argued in IPR2015-01717, the '660 patent expired (20 years from the June 27, 1995 parent filing) and "was expired" by August 2015 — foreclosing most forward-looking damages. The related DDG-owned '196 patent was separately challenged in IPR2014-01359 (LG Display/LG Display America v. DDG). Meanwhile the VIZIO companion case (1:13-cv-02112) went the distance, with Judge Andrews issuing a memorandum opinion on summary judgment, Daubert motions, and a motion to strike on Mar. 1, 2017 (D.I. 387) — the substantive merits ruling in this campaign. In short, the Amazon case is a compact illustration of three things: Acacia's portfolio-splitting device (sibling LLCs, common parent, common counsel, identical pleadings), the Delaware-incorporation venue strategy of the 2013–2016 NPE wave, and the dynamic in which panel suppliers, not the branded OEM, drive the PTAB defense — while the asserted patent expires out from under the litigation.

Sourcing notes and open items

• Well sourced: party identities and Acacia parentage (D.I. 5); the eight asserted patents and the Kindle Fire HD identification (complaint, via RPX's document viewer); filing date, judge assignment, related-case list, and the Dec. 31, 2013 seven-case wave (RPX Insight, Jan. 9, 2014; docket sheets reproduced as PTAB exhibits); the Rambus→Acacia March 2013 transfer (Rambus/Acacia press release); the IPR numbers, dates, and the "no claims unpatentable" result for the '660 (RPX PTAB docket; PTAB institution decision in IPR2015-00487); patent expiration argument (IDT's preliminary response in IPR2015-01717).
• Sourced to docket excerpts drawn from the parallel LG case (1:13-cv-02109), not the Amazon docket directly: plaintiffs' counsel lineup (Farnan LLP as Delaware counsel — Joseph J. Farnan, Jr. and Brian E. Farnan — with Bragalone Conroy PC pro hac vice). I did not verify Amazon's counsel.
• Not verified / do not treat as fact: the reason for the Sept. 5, 2014 closure; whether any license or payment was involved; the outcome of Federal Circuit appeal No. 2017-1413; and the exact contents of the Sept. 29, 2014 final docket entry. The Lumitex/Solid State Opto/$26M sale figure rests on a single translated industry article.

I'll research the docket-level developments, dispositions, and PTAB proceedings for this case.

Let me dig into the docket and look for the answer, motions, and final disposition.

Let me look for the district court docket details and the Federal Circuit appeal outcome.

I've hit the research step limit, so here is the chronology built from what I was able to verify, with explicit flags on where the record is thin.

Key legal developments & outcome — Delaware Display Group LLC et al. v. Amazon.com, Inc., No. 1:13-cv-02106-RGA

A threshold point frames everything below: this case never reached the merits. It ran 249 days and closed on 2014-09-05, well before any claim construction, summary-judgment practice, or PTAB institution decision. So the "developments" are concentrated in the pleading phase and, more significantly, in the parallel PTAB proceedings that continued after the district court case was gone.

1. Filing and initial pleadings (2013-12-31 – early 2014)

• 2013-12-31 — Complaint filed (D.I. 1) asserting eight patents and naming the Kindle Fire HD as an exemplary accused product. Per RPX's docket view: filed 12/31/2013, cause of action "Willful Patent Infringement," 2 plaintiffs, 1 defendant, 1 accused product, 8 patents-in-suit (https://insight.rpxcorp.com/litigation/dedce-53944-delaware-display-group-v-amazon-com).
• 2014-01-08 — Case assigned to Judge Richard G. Andrews, with Magistrate Judge Mary Pat Thynge as referred judge; the assignment order expressly ties this case to the related wave "1:13-cv-02106-RGA through 1:13-cv-02112-RGA" (assignment text reproduced in the PTAB exhibit docket, https://www.docketalarm.com/cases/PTAB/IPR2014-01359/.../Exhibit-2004.pdf).
• ~2014-01-02/06 — Rule 7.1 disclosure (D.I. 5 in the parallel numbering) and a motion for pro hac vice admission of plaintiffs' Texas counsel, filed as D.I. 5 across all seven related cases (same docket exhibit). Plaintiffs' Delaware counsel was Farnan LLP; the Texas IPR/lead counsel was Bragalone Conroy PC (Jeffrey R. Bragalone, Justin B. Kimble), whose appearance is confirmed by the IPR2015-00487 hearing transcript (https://www.docketalarm.com/cases/PTAB/IPR2015-00487/.../Record_of_Oral_Hearing.pdf).
• 2014-01-13 — Summons returned executed (D.I. 7).

Not verified / flagged: I could not retrieve Amazon's answer, counterclaims, or the precise response date from the sources reviewed. Given the 249-day lifecycle, an answer in Q1–Q2 2014 is the reasonable inference, but treat the content of Amazon's pleadings (including any declaratory-judgment counterclaims on the eight patents) as unsourced. Amazon's counsel in this case was also not verified.

2. Pre-trial motions of substance

Not verified. Because the case closed on 2014-09-05, I found no record of a resolved motion to dismiss, transfer, or stay pending IPR. Two points worth noting for accuracy:

• A stay pending IPR was procedurally impossible for the '660 patent in this case: the first '660 petition (IPR2015-00487) was not filed until 2014-12-23, after the case had already closed. Any stay motion would have post-dated dismissal.
• 2017 TC Heartland venue had no bearing here — the case was dismissed three years before it was decided, so the Delaware-incorporation venue theory pleaded in the complaint (Compl. ¶¶ 6, 8) was never tested.

3. Claim construction (Markman)

None. The case terminated before any Markman briefing, hearing, or order. The only construction of the asserted claims in this campaign occurred at the PTAB under the broadest reasonable interpretation standard then in force (and, for the expired '660, under a Phillips-type standard, as the patent owner argued — see Patent Owner's Response, IPR2015-00487, https://www.docketalarm.com/cases/PTAB/IPR2015-00487/.../Patent_Owners_Response.pdf).

4. Discovery milestones

None verified. No scheduling order, discovery cutoff, or expert-discovery events were recoverable from the sources reviewed.

5. Trial, verdict, post-trial motions

None. No trial, verdict, JMOL, new-trial, or fee motion in this case.

6. Final disposition

• 2014-09-05 — Case closed (RPX docket). 2014-09-29 — latest docket entry recorded. (https://insight.rpxcorp.com/litigation/dedce-53944-delaware-display-group-v-amazon-com)
• Cause unverified. The record I could review does not disclose whether closure was by stipulated/voluntary dismissal following a license, a settlement, or otherwise. In the Acacia enforcement pattern a paid license with a Rule 41(a) dismissal is the common outcome, but I am not asserting that here — the reason remains unsourced. Note the metadata's single-patent framing ('660 only) also does not match the 8 patents RPX records as in suit.

7. Parallel PTAB proceedings (the real action in this campaign)

The '660 challenges were driven by the display-panel suppliers, not Amazon — consistent with the prior summary:

Sources: IPR2015-00487 Final Written Decision and Petitioners' Notice of Appeal (RPX-hosted PDFs, https://insight.rpxcorp.com/federal_circuit/[433800](/patent/433800)/rpx-ptab/IPR2015-00487/...); IPR2015-01717 institution/joinder decision (https://www.docketalarm.com/cases/PTAB/IPR2015-00487/.../Decision_IPR2015_01717...pdf); case metadata (https://ipverse.greyb.com/ptab-web/cases/case-details/IPR2015-00487); RPX PTAB docket (https://insight.rpxcorp.com/ptab/3758-lg-display-v-innovative-display-technologies-llc-ipr-of-660).

Board and counsel: IPR2015-00487 panel — APJs Lora M. Green, Thomas L. Giannetti, Beverly M. Bunting (Giannetti, Miriam L. Quinn, and Bunting on the '1717 joinder). Petitioner counsel: Robert Pluta (Finney/Finnegan). Patent-owner counsel: Justin Kimble and Jeffrey Bragalone (Bragalone Conroy).

8. Effect of the IPRs on this litigation and appeal

• On the Amazon case: none. The case was closed before the 2015–2016 institution decisions, so no stay, estoppel, or claim-cancellation ever touched this docket. The '660 challenges were pending against the patent owner (IDT) in the LG-related proceedings, not against Amazon.
• Practical effect of the patent-owner "win": As the prior summary notes, IDT argued in IPR2015-01717 that the '660 patent had already expired (20 years from the 1995-06-27 parent filing, placing expiration around mid-2015). The Board's "no claims unpatentable" outcome therefore preserved validity but little forward-looking value.
• Appeal: The IPR2015-00487 petitioners filed a Notice of Appeal dated 2016-12-23 raising three issues (Board's § 103 finding on Oe + Etsuo; treatment of the light-source limitation; its claim construction and obviousness law). This is the appeal the prior summary records at Fed. Cir. No. 2017-1413. Outcome not verified in the sources reviewed — flag as open.

Bottom line

The key "development" in DDG v. Amazon is its early and unexplained termination (2014-09-05) — no Markman, no dispositive motions, no trial, no judgment. The substantive legal action on the asserted '660 patent played out entirely in the PTAB (IPR2015-00487, joined by IPR2015-01717), which upheld every challenged claim on 2016-07-15, subject to a now-pending-but-unverified Federal Circuit appeal by LG.

Open items to chase: the reason for the 2014-09-05 closure and the 2014-09-29 final entry; Amazon's answer/counterclaims and counsel; the outcome of Fed. Cir. No. 2017-1413; and independent verification (beyond the prior summary) of IPR2014-01094, IPR2015-00363, and IPR2015-00495 dispositions.

I'll research plaintiff-side counsel using docket and firm sources.

Let me pull the Amazon-case docket directly and the complaint signature blocks.

Plaintiff-side counsel of record — Delaware Display Group LLC et al. v. Amazon.com, Inc., No. 1:13-cv-02106-RGA (D. Del.)

Bottom line up front. Plaintiffs DDG and IDT used the same two-firm team in every complaint of the Dec. 31, 2013 seven-case Delaware wave (Nos. 13-2106 through 13-2112): Bragalone Conroy PC of Dallas, Texas, as lead/outside patent trial counsel (admitted pro hac vice), and Farnan LLP of Wilmington as Delaware local counsel, with Joseph J. Farnan, Jr. designated LEAD ATTORNEY. An Acacia in-house lawyer, Eric Lucas, also appears in the record of the companion cases but is not counsel of record.

Counsel roster

Sourcing and how solid each link is

• Verified for the wave, applied to Amazon by identity of counsel and pleadings. The full attorney listing I could actually read — Joseph J. Farnan, Jr. (LEAD), Brian E. Farnan, Daniel F. Olejko, Jeffrey R. Bragalone, Justin B. Kimble, Patrick J. Conroy, and T. William Kennedy, Jr., all with Farnan LLP / Bragalone Conroy PC and matching email domains (@farnanlaw.com, @bcpc-law.com) — comes from the docket sheet of 1:13-cv-02109 (LG), reproduced as an exhibit in PTAB IPR2015-00506 (Docket Alarm copy of the 13-2109 docket). The VIZIO companion (13-2112) docket on Justia independently lists plaintiffs "Represented By: Jeffrey R. Bragalone … Patrick J. [Conroy] … Brian E. Farnan … Joseph J. Farnan, Jr. … Michael J. [Farnan] … T. [William Kennedy] … Justin B. [Kimble] … Daniel F. [Olejko]" (Justia docket).
• Bragalone Conroy was unquestionably IDT/DDG's counsel for this patent family. IDT's PTAB power of attorney appoints "practitioners at Bragalone Conroy P.C., 2200 Ross Ave., Suite 4500 West, Dallas, TX 75201," naming Bragalone and Kimble (POA, IPR2015-00897) — IPR2015-00897 concerns the very '660 patent at issue here. Bragalone's pro hac vice motion in IPR2015-01868 states that he "currently represents IDT in its assertion of U.S. Patent No. 7,434,974 and its related patents in numerous cases … pending in the District of Delaware," citing the LG and Vizio Delaware actions and calling himself "lead counsel in those actions."
• The complaint signature block. Complaints in this campaign are signed "/s/ Jeffrey R. Bragalone" (e.g., the companion HP complaint from the same April 2014 E.D. Tex. wave, reproduced in a PTAB exhibit at ptacts.uspto.gov). I did not directly view the signature block or the attorney listing on the Amazon docket sheet itself.

Explicit caveats (things I could not verify)

1. I did not read the Amazon docket's own "represented by" entries. PACER/RPX and Justia renderings for 1:13-cv-02106 that I could retrieve show case metadata (filed 12/31/2013; closed 09/05/2014; Judge Andrews, Magistrate Thynge) but not the full attorney block. The roster above is established for the identical-counsel companion cases and is the correct plaintiff-side team for this family, but I am inferring the Amazon entry rather than quoting it. Anyone needing a citation-grade answer should pull the D.I. 1 attorney listing and any pro hac vice orders from the 13-2106 docket directly.
2. No sealed-counsel issue is known; the case was dismissed by agreement (per Judge Andrews' Lenovo opinion, "The cases against Amazon (CA No. 13-2106 D.I. 19) … were dismissed by agreement"), so the appearance record should be complete and short — this case ran only ~249 days.
3. Defense counsel is outside this task and was not verified (the prior section flagged that gap; nothing here fills it).
4. Do not treat "Eric Lucas" as counsel of record. He is identified in the opinions as in-house counsel for Acacia Research Group and, later, IDT/DDG; his only formal role in this litigation family was as a declarant. He did not enter an appearance.
5. T. John Ward, Jr. and Claire Abernathy Henry (Ward & Smith Law Firm, Longview) appear as plaintiffs' counsel in the parallel E.D. Tex. IDT suits, not in the Delaware Amazon case. Mentioned only so the two waves aren't conflated.

I'll research Amazon's counsel of record in this case across docket sources, firm announcements, and court filings.

Let me try different search formulations.

Let me check CourtListener/RECAP for the docket sheet and filings.

I hit a search-step limit before I could pull the Amazon docket sheet directly, so I want to be candid up front about the evidentiary status of this section rather than pad it with guesses.

Counsel of record for Defendant Amazon.com, Inc. — status: not verified

*Bottom line: I could not confirm, from the sources I was able to retrieve, the identity of any attorney who entered an appearance for Amazon.com, Inc. in Delaware Display Group LLC et al. v. Amazon.com, Inc., No. 1:13-cv-02106-RGA (D. Del.).* The previously generated case overview flagged the same gap ("I did not verify Amazon's counsel"), and this targeted pass did not close it. Because the instruction is not to invent attorneys, I am reporting the null result plus exactly where the answer sits.

What I retrieved, and why it doesn't answer the question

• RPX Insight docket page for 1:13-cv-02106 (https://insight.rpxcorp.com/litigation/dedce-53944-delaware-display-group-v-amazon-com) confirms only the metadata already in the case summary — filed 12/31/2013, closed 09/05/2014, latest entry 09/29/2014, Judge Andrews + referred Judge Thynge, 8 patents-in-suit, 249 days in litigation, one accused product. The RPX litigation summary returned no party-counsel field in the content I could see.
• Stanford NPE Litigation Database entries for the asserted patents (e.g., 7,434,974; 7,300,194; 7,914,196) confirm the case caption/number/court but surface no counsel data in the retrieved text.
• Docket Alarm / PTAB exhibit copies of the parallel docket — e.g., DDG's Exhibit 2004 in IPR2015-00506 reproduces the 1:13-cv-02109-RGA (LG) docket sheet, not the Amazon one. As the prior section noted, this is exactly the trap: the widely circulated docket excerpts from this seven-case wave are drawn from the LG case, and plaintiffs' counsel lineup in those excerpts (Farnan LLP as Delaware counsel; Bragalone Conroy pro hac vice) is the plaintiff's team, not Amazon's.
• Two conventional queries for the Amazon docket sheet and counsel appearances returned zero results, and my final query exceeded the tool's step cap.

What the record would show if pulled (and where)

In D. Del. practice at the time, Amazon's appearance would be docketed as one or two short entries in January–February 2014, since the case was assigned Jan. 8, 2014 and terminated Sept. 5, 2014 (a ~249-day life, so the defense team had roughly eight months of activity):

1. A Notice of Appearance / Entry of Appearance by Delaware counsel (D. Del. requires a member of the bar of the court to appear; out-of-state counsel appear only by motion), typically filed within days of the answer or a Rule 12 motion.
2. One or more Motions for Pro Hac Vice Admission attaching the applicant's certificate of good standing and usually a proposed order — these name the out-of-town lead trial counsel and their firm.
3. Potentially a stipulation extending time (D.I. in the teens), which in the related cases was filed before any merits response.

The authoritative free sources to run are CourtListener's RECAP docket for dcd/ded case 1:13-cv-02106 (https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/?q=%2213-cv-02106%22 — filter to D. Del.), PACER itself (ded 1:13-cv-02106-RGA), and the Docket Alarm page for the case, which hosts the exhibit-PDF copies of the same docket sheets that surfaced the LG-team data.

Candidates I am deliberately not asserting

I can say this much as general background without vouching for it: in District of Delaware patent matters in the 2013–2016 window, Amazon.com, Inc. was frequently represented by Morris, Nichols, Arsht & Tunnell LLP (Wilmington) as local counsel, with national patent firms appearing pro hac vice, and Amazon also used other Wilmington firms (e.g., Potter Anderson & Corroon) in various matters. I have no filing, opinion, or press source tying any specific firm or attorney to this docket, so treat that entire sentence as a hypothesis for verification, not a finding. I am not naming individual Amazon litigators because doing so on this record would be fabrication.

Recommended next steps to close the gap

1. Pull the CourtListener RECAP docket for 1:13-cv-02106 and read the Jan.–Feb. 2014 entries (notice of appearance + PHV motions) — this alone should resolve the question in one page.
2. If RECAP lacks the scanned images, the D. Del. CM/ECF docket (ded) will show the filer names on each entry even when the PDF is paywalled.
3. Cross-check against the Mar. 1, 2017 memorandum opinion in the VIZIO companion case (1:13-cv-02112-RGA, D.I. 387), which lists appearances in the caption/signature blocks for the same plaintiff-side team and would show whether Amazon's chosen defense counsel overlapped with any co-defendant's.

Flagging a contradiction to the existing sections: none found on party identity or case metadata — the RPX and Stanford records are consistent with the case overview. The only correction to reinforce is that the counsel names circulating in the PTAB exhibits from this wave belong to the plaintiff side (Farnan/Bragalone Conroy, and in the IPRs, respondent counsel such as Justin Kimble per the PTAB counsel data for IPR2015-00492), not to Amazon.