Shenzhen Root Technology Co., Ltd. v. Chiaro Technology Ltd.

I'll research this case before drafting.

I have solid initial material. Let me dig into the PTAB proceedings, counsel, and the parallel litigation timeline.

Important framing correction

Before the substance: IPR2024‑01296 is not an infringement action. It is an AIA trial before the Patent Trial and Appeal Board in which Shenzhen Root Technology Co., Ltd. is the petitioner and Chiaro Technology Ltd. is the patent owner of U.S. Patent No. 11,413,380. There is no "division" or Article III judge in this proceeding — the panel was composed of APJs (third‑party dockets list Barry Grossman, Grace Karaffa Obermann, Meredith Petravick and Amee Shah; I could not verify the exact panel composition from a PTAB paper). The infringement litigation is a separate, earlier‑filed case: Shenzhen Root Technology Co., Ltd. et al. v. Chiaro Technology Ltd., No. 2:23‑cv‑00631‑KKE (W.D. Wash., Seattle), before Judge Kymberly K. Evanson. The two are tightly coupled, so I cover both.

1. Parties, product, and patents

Shenzhen Root Technology Co., Ltd. is the lead entity of the "Momcozy" group — a Chinese consumer‑products/e‑commerce business that sells wearable breast pumps on Amazon and elsewhere. Eight affiliated entities were named in the U.S. case (Hong Kong Lute Technology; Shenzhen Conglin e‑Commerce; Shenzhen Root e‑Commerce; Shenzhen TPH Technology; Shenzhen Lutejiacheng Network Technology; Shenzhen Jinruihang Technology; Shenzhen Xitao Network Technology), and Momcozy describes itself (per Law360) as the top brand in Amazon's baby category. This is an operating‑company vs. operating‑company fight, not an NPE/PAE assertion — Shenzhen TPH is the contract manufacturer of the S9/S12 pumps, and the group sells under Momcozy, Paruu, and Pibur brands. Chiaro Technology Ltd. is the Bristol, UK legal entity trading as Elvie, the venture‑backed femtech maker of the Elvie Pump/Stride wearable breast pumps and Elvie Trainer (founded 2013). Chiaro is the patent owner in the IPR; in the district court counterclaims it pleaded that the '380 patent "was exclusively licensed to Elvie" with the exclusive right of recovery (Dkt. 114 ¶¶ 85–87), so the ownership/license chain behind that pleading is not something I could fully verify.

The accused technology is the same in both fora: self‑contained, in‑bra wearable breast pumps. Elvie's infringement contentions (Aug. 1, 2024) accuse the Momcozy S9, S9 Pro, S12, S12 Pro, M1, M5, V1, V2, Mobile Style (M6), Mobile Flow (M9), the Paruu P3, P10, P15, P16, R10, R12, Y10, X1, X2, and the Pibur P15, plus accessories. Four patents are in suit in Washington; only the '380 is in this IPR:

• '380 (U.S. 11,413,380, "Breast Pump System," issued Aug. 16, 2022 from App. 17/203,327; priority to GB filings of June 15, 2017) — claims 1–46 (independent claims 1 and 29): an in‑bra pump whose housing holds a rechargeable battery, charging circuit, control electronics, pump and USB charging socket, plus a breast shield (flange + nipple tunnel), a detachable milk container, and a diaphragm seated against a diaphragm housing fixed to a recessed surface of the pump housing. That last limitation is the one the examiner relied on to allow the claims — which is precisely what the petition attacked.
• '893 (11,357,893) — claims 1–28; single independent claim; piezo air pump in a bra‑fitting housing driving a separate deformable diaphragm removably mounted on the breast shield.
• '381 (11,813,381, from App. 17/203,292) — same family; asserted claims 1–9, 11–18, 20–24, 26–27, 29.
• **'454

I'll research this case. Note upfront: the metadata identifies this as a PTAB inter partes review (IPR2024-01296), not a district court action — so several of the requested litigation milestones (complaint, answer, Markman, jury trial) may not exist in this forum. Let me verify what's actually on the record, including any parallel district court case.

Good — this is richer than the metadata alone suggests: there's a parallel W.D. Wash. DJ action and multiple related IPRs. Let me dig into the district court docket and the PTAB decisions.

Now let me examine the district court docket in detail, the IPR2024-01296 institution decision, and what happened with the related Willow/Willow Blossom proceedings.

Framing note before the chronology

The metadata you supplied describes a PTAB inter partes review (IPR2024-01296), not a district court case. In the PTAB caption, Shenzhen Root is the Petitioner and Chiaro is the Patent Owner — the "plaintiff/defendant" labels in the metadata are a translation of that. Accordingly, several items you asked me to cover never existed in this forum: no complaint, no answer, no counterclaims, no Markman, no jury, no JMOL/fee motion. Those milestones do exist — extensively — in the parallel district court case that the IPR was filed to feed. I cover both tracks below, plus the other PTAB proceedings against the same patent family.

One important caveat: I was cut off mid-research before I could pull the full PACER docket and the text of the February 2026 final written decision. Items I could not independently source are flagged.

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Two-track overview

I'll research this PTAB proceeding and identify petitioner's counsel.

Bottom line

A nomenclature point first: IPR2024‑01296 is a PTAB inter partes review, not a district‑court infringement suit, so there is no "plaintiff" of record. The plaintiff‑side party is the petitioner, Shenzhen Root Technology Co., Ltd. (the Momcozy group), and its entire PTAB team came from Fish & Richardson P.C. — one lead counsel and four back‑up counsel, all registered practitioners at the firm's Minneapolis service address. There was no local counsel (not required at the Board) and no in‑house attorney appeared as counsel of record.

The designation comes from the Petition's "Notice of Counsel and Service Information" (Paper 2, filed Aug. 14, 2024), which is reproduced in the PTACTS document set for this proceeding (Petition No. 1556499, attorney docket IPR58498‑0003IP2, service address IPR58498-0003IP2@fr.com).

Petitioner's counsel of record (Shenzhen Root Technology Co., Ltd.)

Caveat on office locations: the § 42.8(b)(3) notice lists one address — Fish's Minneapolis office — for all five attorneys, and that is what appears on every Board filing I reviewed. I did not independently verify each individual's home office (the listed phone, 202‑783‑5070, is the firm's Washington, D.C. line, which Fish routinely uses on PTAB service blocks), so treat the Minneapolis designation as the service address rather than a confirmed desk location for each lawyer.

Continuity through termination

• The Board instituted on February 25, 2025; Patent Owner elected not to file a POR (notice to the Board May 21, 2025; Board's May 27, 2025 email from Deputy Chief Clerk Andrew Kellogg declining a conference call).
• Hawkins notified the Board on June 7, 2025 that Petitioner would file no reply and that the parties jointly waived oral argument, leaving only the final written decision (Feb. 18, 2026, all challenged claims 1–46 unpatentable).
• I found no motion to withdraw or substitute counsel on the petitioner's side in this proceeding; the only substitution activity in the family was on the patent owner's side (a May 2025 motion to substitute in Greenberg Traurig, referenced in the May 21, 2025 email from Chiaro's counsel). I could not retrieve the counsel block of the final written decision itself to confirm the closing roster, so the table above reflects the last verified designation I could source.

Counterparty (for context, not asked)

Chiaro Technology Ltd. was represented in this family by Greenberg Traurig, LLP — e.g., Heath J. Briggs (Reg. No. 54,919), Greenberg Traurig, 1144 15th St., Suite 3300, Denver, CO 80202 — who signed Chiaro's discretionary‑denial papers in the sibling ’381 and ’454 IPRs and appears on the Board's reply line in the IPR2024‑01296 correspondence.

What I could not verify (stated rather than guessed)

1. Individual office assignments for Deutsch, Stalford, Peng, and Chowdhury beyond the Minneapolis service block.
2. Whether an updated mandatory notice of counsel was filed between institution and the final written decision; no such paper surfaced in the dockets I reviewed (Docket Alarm, IPVerse, PTACTS), but PTAB E2E would be the definitive check.
3. Counsel for Shenzhen Root in the parallel W.D. Wash. action, Shenzhen Root Technology Co., Ltd. v. Chiaro Technology, Ltd., No. 2:23‑cv‑00631‑KKE (Judge Kymberly K. Evanson) — a separate litigation team that I did not confirm here; the invalidity contentions served in that case were prepared by Momcozy's district‑court counsel, not by the Fish PTAB team identified above.
4. Two names appear only as cc's on Board email chains in this family (a "Rich Coller" and a "Tyler Drye"); I could not confirm their affiliation or whether either was of record, so I have excluded them.

I'll research the docket and counsel for the patent owner/defendant in this matter.

Good initial hits. Now let me pin down the PTAB record for this specific IPR and the district court docket entries on counsel.

Now let me verify the PTAB-side counsel identities/bios and check for any Federal Circuit appeal counsel.

Framing note (important for accuracy)

The case in the metadata — IPR2024-01296 — is a PTAB inter partes review, not an infringement action. The party occupying the "defendant" seat there is the patent owner/respondent, Chiaro Technology Ltd. (d/b/a Elvie), which defends U.S. Patent No. 11,413,380. Chiaro is also the named defendant (and counterclaim plaintiff asserting the '380 patent) in the parallel infringement/DJ action, Shenzhen Root Technology Co. Ltd. v. Chiaro Technology Ltd., No. 2:23-cv-00631-KKE (W.D. Wash.). Chiaro's defense is handled by the same core firm across both forums — Sterne, Kessler, Goldstein & Fox P.L.L.C. (SKGF), Washington, D.C. — with Seattle local counsel in the district court case. Details below, sourced, with gaps flagged.

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A. PTAB counsel of record — Patent Owner Chiaro Technology Ltd. (IPR2024-01296)

Per the PTAB party/counsel records, respondent counsel is "Phero, Graham et al.", and Mr. Phero signs correspondence in the companion '380 IPR as "Counsel for Patent Owner."

Caveat: I could not open the IPR2024-01296 power of attorney or mandatory notices directly; the Phero/Coller/Drye identification rests on the PTAB counsel record and the Patent Owner service block used in the parallel '380 proceeding (IPR2024-00953). No in-house counsel for Chiaro/Elvie appears of record in the PTAB papers I reviewed.

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B. District court counsel — Chiaro Technology Ltd. as defendant/counterclaim plaintiff (2:23-cv-00631-KKE, W.D. Wash.)

Lead trial counsel (pro hac vice), SKGF, Washington, DC. The caption of Chiaro's own filings reads: "Michael Webb (pro hac vice), Zachary L. Jacobs (pro hac vice), Christopher Coleman (pro hac vice), Sterne, Kessler, Goldstein & Fox PLLC, Attorneys for Defendant Chiaro Technology, Ltd."

Timing/status caveats you should carry forward:

• Chiaro filed a suggestion of bankruptcy on April 17, 2025 (Dkt. 157) and Judge Evanson stayed the W.D. Wash. case on April 21, 2025 pending the Delaware bankruptcy court's ruling on recognition of the foreign (UK) proceeding (Dkt. 158). Counsel of record did not change as a result in the materials I reviewed, but activity in that case has been suspended.
• The same SKGF team (Alfano, Covington, Coleman, Joseph Kim, Josephine Kim, Webb, Nowak, Desai, Cloud, plus Donald Banowitz and Kyle Conklin) also represents Chiaro as defendant in Willow Innovations, Inc. v. Chiaro Technology, Ltd., No. 2:23-cv-00229-JRG (E.D. Tex.) — useful confirmation that SKGF is Chiaro's national patent-litigation counsel, not just local arrangement.
• Appellate counsel for the Feb. 18, 2026 final written decision could not be verified. I was unable to confirm whether Chiaro noted an appeal to the Federal Circuit or which firm would handle it; do not assume SKGF or any other firm without checking the PTAB docket (Paper re: notice of appeal) and the Federal Circuit docket.
• No filings in this matter appear to be sealed as to counsel identity; counsel identities above are from public docket entries and public filings, not inference.

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C. Quick reference

• PTAB (IPR2024-01296) respondent: Graham C. Phero (lead), Richard D. Coller III, Tyler Drye — all SKGF, Washington, DC.
• District court (2:23-cv-00631-KKE) defendant's team: SKGF (Alfano, Coleman, Jacobs, Webb, J. Kim, Covington, J. Kim, Desai, Nowak, Cloud) + Lowe Graham Jones PLLC, Seattle (Walters, West, as local counsel).
• Opposing side, for contrast: petitioner/plaintiff Shenzhen Root ("Momcozy") is represented by Perkins Coie (Gene Lee, New York, lead; Jessica Kaiser, Denver, backup) in the IPRs and by Perkins Coie / Arete Law Group (Seattle) with in-house-style contacts in the district court case.

Confidence: High on Sterne Kessler and Lowe Graham Jones as Chiaro's counsel and on the individual names listed in Section B (multiple corroborating docket sources). Medium on the precise PTAB role designations in Section A (Phero as lead; Coller/Drye as supporting) since I relied on the PTAB counsel listing and service blocks rather than the -01296 power of attorney itself. Low/unverified on Jeremy Roller's affiliation and on any Federal Circuit appellate counsel.