Calfee, Halter & Griswold

Firm overview. Calfee, Halter & Griswold LLP is a full-service, regional corporate law firm founded in 1903 and headquartered in Cleveland (The Calfee Building, 1405 E. 6th St.), with offices in Columbus, Cincinnati, and Indianapolis (and, per the firm's own materials and directory listings, Washington, D.C. and New York). Chambers counts roughly 160 lawyers, making it one of Ohio's largest firms rather than a national BigLaw or IP boutique. Chambers USA lists Calfee as a "Leading firm," and its Intellectual Property group is ranked Band 1 in Ohio — the group has about 40 attorneys, more than 30 of whom are registered before the USPTO.

IP litigation specialty. The IP practice spans patent, trademark, and copyright litigation and prosecution, plus trade secret and IPR work. Chambers describes the team as strongest in the engineering, chemical, and biological sectors, with heavy manufacturing and consumer-products clientele (e.g., Lincoln Electric, Swagelok, STERIS, GOJO, RPM, Teva, and Chinese manufacturers BOE and BYD). Partner-level experience runs across electrical, software, mechanical, medical device, pharmaceutical/life-science, and semiconductor arts. The tracked matters reflect the electrical/LED space: the firm appears for defendant Savant Technologies d/b/a GE Lighting in litigation over Feit Electric's white-filament LED patent, U.S. Patent No. 8,604,678.

Side preference. In the tracked case set, Calfee's appearances are uniformly defense-side (2 of 2) and solely as local counsel (4 appearances) for an operating company, Savant/GE Lighting — not NPE plaintiff work. The firm's own descriptions are mixed (it handles enforcement and defense, and partner Josh Ryland has secured a reported $40 million plaintiff-side semiconductor verdict), but the available dataset indicates a defense-oriented, local-counsel role in patent litigation for corporate clients.

Notable cases and PTAB/IPR. The principal tracked matter is Feit Electric Co. v. Savant Technologies LLC d/b/a GE Lighting, No. 1:24-cv-00473 (N.D. Ohio, filed March 2024), and its companion Savant v. Feit action, in which Calfee serves as local counsel with Ronald M. McMillan (a Cleveland senior counsel whose broader practice is commercial/construction litigation, consistent with a local-counsel role). The dispute is active: the PTAB instituted IPR2024-01357 (Savant/LEDVANCE v. Feit) on the '678 patent in June 2025, with a final written decision expected around December 2025. IPR/PGR work is a genuine part of the practice but not a national-volume one: the firm's Chambers profile cites IPR handling, Kyle Deighan maintains a PTAB practice for both patent owners and challengers, and Joshua Friedman's bio references six IPRs for an Asia-based manufacturer client.

Key practitioners. Reliably sourced IP leaders include John S. Cipolla (firm vice chair; Chambers Band 1, IP-Ohio), Mark W. McDougall and Billy C. Raulerson (IP practice co-chairs; Chambers Band 2 and 3), and Todd R. Tucker (IP partner and director of international business, noted for U.S.–China work). Among litigation partners, Kyle Deighan (PTAB-focused, ex-Sidley) and Joshua A. Friedman (electrical/software/medical-device, admitted to the Federal Circuit bar) are the most prominent on the litigation side; Friedman is the IP partner tied to the tracked Savant matters.