Valtrus Innovations Ltd. v. Digital Realty Trust, Inc. et al.

I'll research this case thoroughly using web search to verify the details.

Let me dig deeper into the parties, the patent, and the related litigation structure.

Let me verify the docket specifics, filing dates, and the broader MDL context.

Valtrus Innovations Ltd. v. Digital Realty Trust, Inc. et al., 2:24-cv-00139-JRG (E.D. Tex.)

The parties. Valtrus Innovations Ltd. is an Irish-incorporated patent-holding company — a non-practicing entity that acquired an early-2000s data-center cooling portfolio from Hewlett-Packard/Hewlett Packard Enterprise (the JPML motion describes Valtrus as "the successor to a substantial patent portfolio created by Hewlett Packard Enterprise," and Stanford's NPE database classifies Valtrus's asserter category as "Acquired patents"). Valtrus holds legal title, but on the same day it bought the patents it executed a declaration of trust conveying the economic and enforcement rights to Key Patent Innovations Ltd. (KPI), also Irish, which KPI's own managing director has described as controlling Valtrus's enforcement decisions; KPI was later added as a co-plaintiff across the campaign to cure a § 281 statutory-standing challenge. The defendants, Digital Realty Trust, Inc. and Digital Realty Trust, L.P., are the operating REIT/LP behind one of the world's largest data-center colocation platforms; venue was predicated on its DFW11 (Carrollton, TX) and DFW26 (Lewisville, TX) facilities. Vertiv Corporation, the supplier of Liebert-brand cooling units and iCOM/iCOM-S control systems used in the accused facilities, intervened in the case.

The accused technology. Valtrus did not accuse a product Digital Realty sells; it accused the act of operating cooling and atmospheric-control systems inside Digital Realty's data centers — direct infringement under 35 U.S.C. § 271(a) by "making" and "using" the claimed methods/systems. The claim charts rely on third-party equipment present in those facilities — Vigilent's AI-based wireless cooling optimization, Schneider Electric's thermal-management systems, Vertiv/Liebert's iCOM controls, and (in related cases) Stulz gear — which is why Valtrus's supplier-versus-customer strategy drew Vertiv into the case as intervenor. The complaint as filed asserted seven patents (the case metadata and the dismissal order center on the '277 patent, which is the one Valtrus litigated hardest and the only one to reach an IPR): U.S. 6,718,277 — "Atmospheric control within a building" (inventor Ratnesh Sharma; filed Apr. 17, 2002; issued Apr. 6, 2004), claiming a method/system that generates an "empirical atmospheric map" from distributed sensors, compares it to a "template atmospheric map," identifies pattern differentials, and varies the quantity/quality/distribution of conditioned fluid; U.S. 6,854,287 — zonal heat-exchanger cooling where coolant mass flow to each unit is individually manipulated; U.S. 6,862,179 — a controllable partition in a cooling plenum to vary cooling-fluid supply by zone; U.S. 7,031,870 — evaluating data centers via an air-re-circulation index (Supply Heat Index); U.S. 7,339,490 — a modular, addressable sensor assembly for rack-level environmental monitoring; U.S. 9,310,855 — modular "block"-based flexible data-center deployment; and U.S. 7,939,967 — redundant multiple-power-supply control. The older patents expired around 2021–2022, so the claims sought past damages (the complaint repeatedly alleges infringement "before the expiration" of the patents).

Procedural posture and venue. Filed in the Eastern District of Texas, Marshall Division, before Judge Rodney Gilstrap (JRG). This case was one of several "member cases," consolidated for pretrial with the lead case 2:24-cv-00361-JRG (Valtrus v. NTT Data Services) and a companion Digital Realty II case (2:24-cv-00535-JRG). Rather than a merits ruling, the case ended by joint motion: on January 22, 2025 (entered Jan. 23, 2025, Dkt. 24) Judge Gilstrap dismissed all claims and counterclaims in 2:24-cv-00139 and 2:24-cv-00535 with prejudice, each party bearing its own costs, while expressly preserving Vertiv's claims as to other defendants and keeping the lead case open (CourtListener recap; PatSnap's verbatim order text). The Marshall Division matters because it is one of the nation's most experienced and plaintiff-friendly patent venues, with fast local rules; Valtrus leveraged the defendants' in-district data centers to satisfy venue under § 1400(b) and personal jurisdiction.

Why the case is notable. First, it is a building block in an industry-wide assertion campaign targeting the operators of data centers rather than the equipment makers — Digital Realty, CyrusOne, Dawn/Evoque, NTT, DataBank, TierPoint, Equinix, and later Lumen, Prime Data Centers, Cologix, H5, Iron Mountain, CoreSite, Netrality, and Compass. That supplier-versus-customer dynamic produced a declaratory-judgment action by Vertiv (2:24-cv-00907-JRG) and inter partes review IPR2025-00668, in which Vertiv challenges claims 1–21 of the '277 patent on anticipation/obviousness grounds (Nakanishi and Bishop), making this dismissal one data point in a larger validity fight. Second, the Valtrus/KPI trust structure generated a live and unsettled standing dispute: several courts (e.g., the SAP litigation in E.D. Tex.) held Valtrus had Article III standing but lacked statutory standing under § 281 because it retained no "all substantial rights," while the N.D. Cal. Google litigation (Valtrus Innovations v. Google, No. 5:25-cv-07063) went further and dismissed for lack of constitutional standing. Third, in June 2026 the JPML created MDL No. 3190 centralizing the Valtrus/KPI data-center-cooling suits, with conditional transfer orders moving cases (e.g., Compass Datacenters) into E.D. Tex. before Judge Gilstrap. Finally, the commercial backdrop is the AI-driven data-center buildout, where cooling and thermal management have become strategically and economically critical — giving legacy HP/HPE cooling patents renewed monetization value.

Sourcing caveats: The dismissal order and its terms are well documented (Dkt. 24; CourtListener recap gov.uscourts.txed.230090); the broader campaign, IPR, MDL, and standing rulings are grounded in the IPR2025-00668 papers, the N.D. Cal. Google opinion (govinfo USCOURTS-cand-5_25-cv-07063), and press coverage (Patent Lawyer Magazine; HarrisMartin). I could not verify the exact original filing date of 2:24-cv-00139 in this pass (the case number places it in early 2024), and the record does not disclose whether the with-prejudice dismissal rested on a license or settlement — the joint-motion structure and defendant-specific carve-outs are consistent with a negotiated resolution, but that is inference, not a documented fact. The case-metadata patent list ('277 alone) understates the seven patents pleaded in the complaint; I flag that discrepancy rather than resolve it.

I'll research this case thoroughly using web searches across the sources you've specified.

Let me dig deeper into the specific docket for 2:24-cv-00139 and the related proceedings.

Key Legal Developments & Outcome — Valtrus Innovations Ltd. v. Digital Realty Trust, Inc., No. 2:24-cv-00139-JRG (E.D. Tex.)

Analyst note on posture: This was a short-lived, member-case patent suit that lived roughly one year and never reached Markman, dispositive motions, or trial in its own right. Its significance is almost entirely structural: it was one strand of a coordinated, multi-front assertion campaign that Valtrus ran against data-center operators and their equipment suppliers, and it was resolved as part of a defendant-specific carve-out from the larger consolidated litigation. Where the metadata conflicts with web sources (notably the filing date), I flag the conflict rather than paper over it.

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1. The litigation architecture (context you need first)

Case No. 2:24-cv-00139-JRG was not tried on its own. It was consolidated as a MEMBER CASE into Lead Case No. 2:24-cv-00361-JRG (Valtrus Innovations Ltd. v. NTT Data Services, LLC). The dismissal order and docket captions show the consolidated family:

Sources: Dkt. 96 (Lead Case 00361) dismissal order; Dkt. 24 (00139) dismissal order — https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.txed.[230090](/patent/230090)/gov.uscourts.txed.230090.96.0.pdf

Parties and roles:

• Valtrus Innovations Ltd. — Irish patent-monetization entity holding the former Hewlett-Packard/HPE data-center portfolio.
• Key Patent Innovations Ltd. ("KPI") — beneficiary of the declaration of trust through which Valtrus holds the patents; added as a co-plaintiff in the later-filed cases (relevant to the standing problem below).
• Digital Realty Trust, Inc. / L.P. — data-center operator; accused facilities included the DFW11 (Carrollton, TX), DFW26 (Lewisville, TX), and DFW10 data centers.
• Vertiv Corporation — supplier of Liebert-brand cooling units and iCOM/iCOM-S monitoring controls used in the accused facilities; intervenor in 00139 and 00535, and independent DJ plaintiff in 00907.

Counsel (as reported in dockets/PTAB filings): Valtrus — Findlay Craft PC (Eric Hugh Findlay) and Reichman Jorgensen Lehman & Feldberg LLP (Aaron Morris, Ariane S. Mann, Connor Houghton, Matt Berkowitz, Patrick R. Colsher). Digital Realty — Sidley Austin LLP (San Francisco). Vertiv — Nixon Peabody LLP (Daniel J. Schwartz, Timothy Paul Maloney, Ty William Wilson, Randal S. Alexander, William E. Davis III), with The Davis Firm PC and Scheef & Stone LLP as local counsel. (Firm attributions drawn from litigation-database and PTAB documents; treat with moderate confidence.)

Patents in the campaign: The metadata identifies U.S. Patent No. 6,718,277 ('277, "Atmospheric control within a building," issued 2004-04-06) as the patent at issue in 00139. In practice the 00139/00535 complaints asserted a bundle of data-center patents — including the '287 ("Cooling system"), '179 ("Partition for varying the supply of cooling fluid"), '870 ("Data center evaluation using an air re-circulation index"), '490 ("Modular sensor assembly"), '855 ("Flexible data center"), and '967 ("Multiple Power Supply Control"). The '277 patent is the piece of that bundle that carried forward into the parallel PTAB fight. (Sources: Ex Parte complaint analyses for 00139; PatSnap case profile.)

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2. Chronological developments

2.1 Pre-suit (early 2024) — the licensing/demand-letter predicate

Valtrus's campaign began with notice letters to data-center operators. In the parallel CyrusOne answer, CyrusOne admitted receiving a Valtrus letter dated 2024-03-29 (received April 1, 2024) styled "Notice of Infringement of Valtrus Innovation Ltd.'s Patents," addressed to its GC and proposing a license meeting. The recipient declined. This letter campaign — directed at end-users whose infringement theory rested entirely on Vertiv's equipment — is what later gave Vertiv its declaratory-judgment hook.

2.2 Filing of the complaint (2024)

• Complaint in 2:24-cv-00139-JRG. Valtrus (alone) sued Digital Realty Trust, Inc. and L.P. ⚠️ Date conflict: a court-index source lists the 00139 filing as 2024-02-27, while PTAB exhibit descriptions describe "Complaint … Case No. 2:24-cv-00139-JRG (E.D. Tex. June 7, 2024)". I could not fully reconcile these; I would treat the exact 00139 filing date as not firmly established from the sources retrieved. The complaint asserted direct infringement under § 271(a) and attached exemplary claim charts.
• Second Digital Realty suit (2:24-cv-00535-JRG). Valtrus and KPI filed a follow-on against the same Digital Realty entities, docketed later in 2024 (a case profile lists 2024-07-12).

Why KPI was added: This was not cosmetic. In the parallel Valtrus v. SAP litigation (2:24-cv-00021-JRG), the court held that Valtrus did not hold "all substantial rights" in the asserted patents — KPI held the right of first refusal to enforce and controlled alienation — so Valtrus failed the 35 U.S.C. § 281 "patentee" requirement (though Article III standing was satisfied). Adding KPI as a co-plaintiff was the fix. This standing defect also drove the Northern District of California ruling dismissing Valtrus's Google cases for lack of constitutional standing.

2.3 Initial pleadings and Vertiv's intervention (mid-to-late 2024)

• Vertiv moved to intervene in 00139 (and 00535), attaching its indemnity agreements with Digital Realty and CyrusOne and the in-house declaration confirming both customers had demanded indemnification. Intervention was granted, and Vertiv appeared as Intervenor in both member cases.
• Vertiv's own DJ action (2:24-cv-00907). Vertiv filed a standalone declaratory-judgment action against Valtrus (later, in the lead case, expanded against dozens of data-center customers — DataBank, Equinix, Iron Mountain, Lumen, NTT, Sabey, and others), seeking declarations of non-infringement and invalidity. Vertiv's theory: it has a reasonable apprehension of suit and indemnity obligations, and Valtrus's customer claim charts "implicitly contain allegations of direct and indirect infringement … against Vertiv." (Arris/SafeNet line of authority.)
• Answers/counterclaims. In the consolidated lead case, customer defendants (e.g., CyrusOne, DataBank) served answers with declaratory-judgment counterclaims of non-infringement and invalidity on each asserted patent. For 00139 specifically, I found no evidence that Digital Realty ever answered or counterclaimed before dismissal — the case was resolved within roughly a year, and Digital Realty's answer deadlines in the related 00950 action were extended repeatedly (to 2025-01-16, then 2025-02-06). The absence of an answer/counterclaim in 00139 is itself a notable data point suggesting the parties were already negotiating.

2.4 Consolidation and amended pleadings (late 2024)

• 2024-11-15: Amended complaint filed in the lead case (00361), naming Digital Realty (consolidated from 00535) and asserting the '277, '287, '179, '870, '855, and '967 patents with claim charts.
• 2024-11-22: Order (Dkt. 83 in 00361) dismissing claims "that were, or could have been, brought" in Member Case 2:24-cv-00534 with prejudice — early evidence of the defendant-by-defendant settlement pattern that would soon sweep in Digital Realty.
• 2024-11-20: A further Digital Realty suit was filed (2:24-cv-00950-JRG), asserting a different patent trio — U.S. Patent Nos. 6,854,284, 6,868,682, and 7,251,547.

2.5 Pre-trial motions of substance (2024–2025, mostly in the related proceedings)

Within 00139 itself, the substantive motion practice was Vertiv's motion to intervene and the joint motion to dismiss (below). The weightier motions lived in the related cases but shaped 00139's settlement value:

• Valtrus's Rule 12(b)(1) motion to dismiss Vertiv's DJ action (Dkt. 81 in 00907/00361). Valtrus argued there was no Article III controversy with Vertiv; Vertiv opposed, invoking its indemnity obligations and Valtrus's letters. This motion was still pending and being supplemented into mid-2025 (Valtrus filed a Notice of Supplemental Authority on 2025-06-12). It was never resolved on the merits before the Digital Realty carve-out.
• Discovery motions (related case): Valtrus's opposed sealed motion to compel Vertiv to provide complete interrogatory responses (filed 2025-01-31) and Vertiv's motion for protective order (2025-03-10) — signals that the supplier-vs.-patent-owner discovery fight was heating up even as the operator cases settled.
• No motion to transfer or motion to stay pending IPR was filed in 00139. No § 1404(a) transfer motion and no IPR-based stay motion appear in the record for this case. E.D. Tex./Judge Gilstrap was the unchallenged forum (Valtrus pleaded venue over Digital Realty's DFW11/DFW26 facilities).

2.6 Claim construction (Markman) — 00139 never reached it

• 00139: no Markman. The case was dismissed before any claim-construction exchange.
• Related lead case (00361/00907): Markman did proceed. On 2025-08-11, Vertiv and Valtrus filed the P.R. 4-3 Joint Claim Construction and Prehearing Statement covering the '277, '287, '179, and '870 patents — with no agreed constructions and a combined 4 hours requested at hearing. Notably, because this was a DJ posture, the parties agreed Vertiv would file the opening brief and Valtrus the responsive brief (inverting the usual patentee-first sequence). The Markman hearing was set for 2025-10-15 before Judge Gilstrap. So the '277 claim terms that would have mattered in Digital Realty's case were actually being briefed — just in the customer/supplier DJ track, not in 00139.

2.7 Discovery milestones with strategic significance

In 00139 proper, discovery never matured. The strategically significant discovery activity occurred in the related tracks:

• P.R. 4-1 disclosures exchanged 2025-06-11 (Vertiv) and 2025-06-12 (Valtrus), with P.R. 4-2 disclosures following (2025-07-21) in the lead case.
• Third-party/indemnity discovery — Valtrus's motion to compel Vertiv's interrogatory responses and the parties' privilege-log disputes — targeted the indemnity relationship that was the jurisdictional fulcrum of the entire case cluster.
• Venue/standing discovery — the SAP and NetApp/Starbucks tracks saw Valtrus resisting (and defendants pursuing) discovery into the Valtrus/KPI trust structure, which is what ultimately ended the Google cases on standing.

2.8 Trial events / verdict

None. There were no trial events, no verdict, and no JMOL/new-trial/fee motions in 00139. Trial in the surviving lead-case track was calendared for jury selection 2026-04-06 with pretrial conference 2026-03-02 (Docket Control Order of 2024-09-03; First Amended DCO 2025-07-10) — dates that have no bearing on this dismissed member case.

2.9 Final disposition — dismissal with prejudice (January 2025)

This is the centerpiece outcome:

• 2025-01-17: Valtrus and KPI filed a Notice of Voluntary Dismissal in the even-later Digital Realty suit, 2:24-cv-00950-JRG (Dkt. 15) — an early sign of the global Digital Realty stand-down.
• 2025-01-22 (signed) / 2025-01-23 (entered): Judge Gilstrap GRANTED the joint motion to dismiss in part (Dkt. 24 in 00139; Dkt. 94/96 in 00361). The order:
  • dismissed with prejudice "all claims and counterclaims that were or could have been brought" between plaintiffs and Digital Realty only, including as to Vertiv's role as Intervenor;
  • expressly preserved the caveat that nothing resolved Vertiv's claims except as to Digital Realty's use of Vertiv technology;
  • ordered each party to bear its own costs, expenses, and attorneys' fees;
  • denied all remaining relief as moot; and
  • closed 00139 and 00535 while maintaining 00361 as the open lead case.

The "or could have been brought" language is a deliberately broad preclusion formulation — functionally a patent-specific, defendant-specific covenant not to sue for the asserted data-center bundle as to Digital Realty. The mutual cost-bearing and joint-motion structure are hallmarks of a negotiated (likely licensed) resolution.

Why "in part"? The carve-out is the tell: Valtrus was settling with the operator customer while continuing to press the equipment supplier (Vertiv) and other data-center defendants in the lead case. The settlement decoupled Digital Realty from the supply-chain theory.

No appeal. There is no Federal Circuit appeal from 00139; a dismissal with prejudice by joint motion is not appealable by the dismissing parties.

Present posture: 00139 is closed/terminated (2025-01-23). The related lead case (00361) and Vertiv's DJ action (00907) remained active at the time of the sources retrieved, with Markman set for 2025-10-15 and trial in April 2026.

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3. Parallel PTAB proceedings on the asserted patents

(a) IPR2025-00668 — Vertiv Corp. v. Valtrus Innovations Ltd., U.S. Patent No. 6,718,277.
This is the direct PTAB challenge to the flagship '277 patent asserted in 00139, filed by Vertiv (not Digital Realty). Vertiv's petition advances invalidity grounds including a Bishop-based anticipation/obviousness theory. Valtrus filed a Patent Owner Preliminary Response seeking discretionary denial, arguing:

• § 314(a) / Fintiv — factors favoring denial: no stay of the parallel district-court litigations (and a stay "highly unlikely"); three district-court trials scheduled months before any Final Written Decision; substantial investment in the parallel proceedings; an ineffective/partial Sotera-type stipulation; overlapping parties/real parties in interest; and "overall weak merits";
• § 325(d) / Advanced Bionics — the same art was already considered during prosecution; and
• "settled expectations"/long delay — Vertiv allegedly knew of the '277 patent since 2009-10-13 and of the Bishop reference since 2013-04-05, an ostensible 15-year delay.
  Sources: PTAB petition/preliminary-response documents (ptacts.uspto.gov petition IDs 1557497, 1557498).

Effect on the litigation: Because 00139 was dismissed with prejudice as to Digital Realty in January 2025 — before the IPR was even in a position to moot anything — the PTAB challenge had no effect on 00139. It matters only to the surviving tracks (Vertiv's DJ action and the customer defendants), where Fintiv factor 2 (trial timing) and factor 4 (overlap) are live. The scheduled Markman (2025-10-15) and trial dates in the lead case are the very "parallel proceedings" Valtrus invokes against institution.

(b) Other Valtrus-related PTAB matters (different patents — not the '277):

• Google LLC v. Valtrus Innovations Ltd., IPR2022-01197 — cited as precedent in the '277 Fintiv briefing; a prior, successful Valtrus-patent IPR.
• SAP America / SAP SE, IPR2025-00419 — challenges U.S. Pat. No. 7,936,738 (a different Valtrus patent), with Sotera-stipulation arguments and the SAP parallel litigation (2:24-cv-00021-JRG) context; the SAP district-court case settled 2025-12-09 (Law360).
• FedEx/NetApp IPR — challenges U.S. Pat. No. 7,932,832 (also a different Valtrus patent), with concurrent ex parte reexamination and FedEx/NetApp/Starbucks DJ actions.

I found no IPR/PGR filed by Digital Realty against the '277 or the other data-center patents asserted in 00139.

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4. Bottom line & strategic reading

1. Outcome: Dismissed with prejudice on 2025-01-23 by joint motion (order signed 2025-01-22), each side bearing its own costs, with broad preclusive language covering "all claims and counterclaims that were or could have been brought" between Valtrus/KPI and Digital Realty — a defendant-specific, portfolio-specific resolution, not a Valtrus withdrawal.
2. No merits adjudication: No Markman, no SJ, no trial, no verdict, no JMOL/fees motions, no appeal in 00139.
3. The real action was structural: The case cannot be understood apart from (i) the consolidation into 00361, (ii) Vertiv's intervention and parallel DJ action, and (iii) the Valtrus/KPI standing defect that forced KPI into the captions and eventually killed the Google cases.
4. PTAB exposure survives only elsewhere: IPR2025-00668 (Vertiv v. Valtrus, '277) is the key parallel challenge, but its Fintiv fate turns on the still-active lead/customer litigation — the very litigation 00139's settlement was engineered to narrow.

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Sourcing caveats

• Docket-entry numbers for 00139 are sparse in the public record; the dismissal order (Dkt. 24 in 00139 / Dkt. 96 in 00361) and the Vertiv intervention filings are the most reliable anchors. Vertiv's motion to intervene, the Rule 12(b)(1) motion (Dkt. 81), and the discovery motions (Dkts. 95, 99, 101) are documented in the lead/related dockets (00361/00907), not necessarily under 00139's number.
• The 00139 filing date is inconsistent across sources (2024-02-27 vs. 2024-06-07); I have not asserted a single date as fact.
• Counsel rosters and some filing dates derive from litigation databases (PatSnap, Ex Parte, Stanford NPE) rather than primary PACER documents and should be verified before use in a filing.
• IPR2025-00668's institution outcome was not established from the sources retrieved; the Fintiv briefing indicates the petition was pending at the last available snapshot.

I'll research the counsel of record for Valtrus Innovations Ltd. in this case.

Let me get the specific docket sheet for case 2:24-cv-00139 and confirm counsel appearances.

Let me confirm the specific appearances in the 00139 docket and details on the plaintiff's counsel.

Plaintiff's Counsel of Record — Valtrus Innovations Ltd. v. Digital Realty Trust, Inc. et al., No. 2:24-cv-00139-JRG

Important framing before the roster. Case 2:24-cv-00139 was a member case consolidated for all pretrial purposes into lead case 2:24-cv-00361-JRG (Valtrus v. NTT Data Services), alongside member cases 2:24-cv-00259, -00534 and -00535. See Dkt. 96 in the lead case (Jan. 22, 2025) at courtlistener storage PDF. The case was then dismissed with prejudice on the parties' joint motion (Dkt. 24 in the 00139 docket, entered Jan. 23, 2025; Dkt. 96 in the lead case), so the appearance list is frozen — no further appearances will be made.

One caveat on sourcing: I could not pull a clean, case-specific PACER docket sheet for -00139 in the searches available, and several intermediary databases conflate the -00139, -00535, -00950 and SAP dockets (same Valtrus counsel team, overlapping appearances). The roster below is drawn from the operative complaint's signature block for "Plaintiff Valtrus Innovations Limited" (reproduced at RPX Insight, litigation doc 15593117) plus the attorney-appearance entries reflected across the Valtrus dockets. Where I could not fully corroborate a specific filing, I flag it.

Counsel of record (plaintiff Valtrus Innovations Ltd.)

Parties/signatories also appearing for Valtrus in the consolidated litigation (and therefore on the shared pretrial docket) include Stuart Hene (Valtrus), per the consolidated-case party/attorney listings reproduced in PTAB filings. I could not independently confirm Hene's firm or office from the sources available, so I list him only as a name appearing on the consolidated docket rather than asserting a firm.

Two things to avoid mis-attributing

1. Kirkland & Ellis "filed in error" appearances. The consolidated docket shows notices of appearance filed "on behalf of Valtrus Innovations Ltd." by Gregory S. Arovas, Todd M. Friedman, Peter J. Evangelatos and Sean M. McEldowney (Kirkland & Ellis) — but each was marked "FILED IN ERROR PER ATTORNEY" and modified on 8/30/2024. Those Kirkland lawyers were in fact counsel for defendant/counterclaim-plaintiff CyrusOne, LLC, not for Valtrus (see CyrusOne's answer/counterclaims, Dkt. 66 in the lead case). They should not be listed as plaintiff's counsel. See the consolidated docket at CourtListener.

2. Key Patent Innovations / Rikesh Patel / Scott Cole. Substitutions and additions — e.g., Rikesh Patel (Jan. 21, 2025) and Scott Lamar Cole (Feb. 26, 2025) — appear in the Valtrus v. SAP matter after Key Patent Innovations Ltd. was joined, not in Digital Realty -00139. Don't carry them over.

Firm context

• Reichman Jorgensen Lehman & Feldberg LLP (Redwood Shores, CA HQ; Washington, D.C.; New York; Austin; Chicago) is a litigation boutique built around high-stakes patent and IP trials; Berkowitz was part of its founding leadership. The firm served as Valtrus's national/lead patent counsel.
• Findlay Craft, P.C. (Tyler, TX) is a long-standing EDTX-local litigation firm; Findlay is a frequent local counsel and first-chair in Marshall/Tyler patent trials.

Citation summary

• Complaint signature block (attorneys for Plaintiff Valtrus Innovations Ltd.): RPX Insight doc 15593117
• Dismissal order (member cases -00139 and -00535 closed with prejudice): Dkt. 96, lead case 2:24-cv-00361-JRG, Jan. 22, 2025 — PDF; entered on the -00139 docket as Dkt. 24 on Jan. 23, 2025 (per PatSnap's verbatim PACER excerpt)
• Consolidated docket / attorney entries and "filed in error" notices: CourtListener 2:24-cv-00361
• Companion refiling attorney list (Colsher, Houghton, Mann, Morris, Berkowitz, Findlay): UniCourt 2:24-cv-00950
• Patent/party record ('277 patent; Valtrus as asserter): Stanford NPE Litigation Database

If you need certainty on individual pro hac vice admissions and the exact dates each attorney appeared in -00139 specifically (as opposed to the consolidated lead docket), that requires a direct PACER pull of the -00139 docket sheet, which was not fully retrievable through open-web search here. Everything above is grounded in the cited filings; I have not invented any attorney, firm, or date.

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

Good leads. Let me pin down each defendant attorney's firm, role, and docket entry.

Let me verify the individual attorneys' current firms and roles.

Counsel of Record — Defendants Digital Realty Trust, Inc. & Digital Realty Trust, L.P.

Important sourcing caveat up front: Docket 2:24-cv-00139-JRG is a member case that was consolidated for pretrial purposes into Lead Case 2:24-cv-00361-JRG (Valtrus Innovations Ltd. v. NTT Data Services, LLC) — see the consolidation order referenced on the lead docket at CourtListener 2:24-cv-00361. Nearly all defense-side appearance entries I could retrieve were docketed on the lead docket and tagged "(Consolidated from 2:24-cv-139)" / "(CONSOLIDATED FROM 2:24-CV-535)." I was not able to pull the raw 2:24-cv-00139 docket sheet itself; the appearance data below comes from the lead-case docket and secondary aggregators. Firm affiliations are verified where sourced; flag noted where they are not.

The case was dismissed with prejudice on Jan. 22/23, 2025 (Dkt. 96 in lead case, granting Dkt. 94 joint motion to dismiss only as to Digital Realty, with Vertiv as intervenor). That same order terminated all appearing defense attorneys, including "Jennifer M Lantz; William Andrew Liddell; Alec Royka; ... Philip W Woo; Holly Elin Engelmann and Louis Norwood Jameson." Source: Order #96, CourtListener and the RECAP PDF of Dkt. 96.

Attorneys who appeared for Digital Realty

What I could not confirm

• No formal "lead counsel" designation for the Digital Realty side appears in any order or entry I retrieved. Based on Duane Morris's own case description (Jameson as IP group chair; Engelmann as the Texas-venue partner), the likely structure is Jameson (Atlanta) as lead with Engelmann (Dallas) as Texas/local counsel, but I am inferring this from firm profiles rather than a docket designation.
• Firm affiliations for Liddell, Royka, and Lantz — docket entries confirm they appeared, but I did not verify which firm(s) they were with. Their appearance dates clustering with Engelmann/Jameson suggests Duane Morris, but that is not confirmed here.
• In-house counsel for Digital Realty — none identified in any retrieved source. Digital Realty's legal department is not named on the public docket.
• No sealed filings relevant to counsel identity were flagged in what I retrieved; the docket shows public appearances rather than sealed ones, and nothing suggests counsel was withheld.

Note on the procedural posture

Digital Realty's defense was coordinated across two Valtrus suits — 2:24-cv-00139-JRG ("Digital Realty I," filed Feb. 27, 2024) and 2:24-cv-00535-JRG ("Digital Realty II," filed Nov. 20, 2024, adding Key Patent Innovations Ltd. as co-plaintiff) — both consolidated into lead case 2:24-cv-00361-JRG before Judge Gilstrap and both dismissed with prejudice in January 2025. The '277 patent named in your metadata is one of the asserted patents; IPR activity against Valtrus's portfolio continued separately at the PTAB (the Duane Morris Legal 500 entry references "patent litigation and IPRs against Valtrus Innovations"), so parallel PTAB work by the same defense team is likely but not confirmed for this specific member case.

If you need the definitive appearance list, the authoritative source is the PACER docket for 2:24-cv-00139-JRG (and the lead 2:24-cv-00361-JRG) — I'd recommend pulling the Notice of Attorney Appearance entries directly, since the aggregator data reproduced above truncates the firm/address fields.