Direction IP Law / Stubbs Alderton & Markiles

I'll verify the firm's profile and the tracked case before drafting.

Let me verify the tracked case and the firm's own site.

Let me check whether Bennett/Direction IP appeared in the IOT Innovations matters, and look at PTAB activity.

Firm overview

The tracked record labels this entity "Direction IP Law / Stubbs Alderton & Markiles," but the public record indicates these are two separate firms combined into a single database record, not a joint venture or merger. Direction IP Law is a small, Chicago-based intellectual property firm (P.O. Box 14184, Chicago, IL 60614) known for its principal, David R. Bennett; a second attorney, Steven G. Kalberg, also appears on Direction IP filings. Stubbs Alderton & Markiles, LLP is a separate mid-size business law firm in Sherman Oaks, California (15260 Ventura Blvd.), with a broader corporate and business-litigation platform and a smaller IP litigation group. No AmLaw 200, AmLaw 100, or Chambers IP ranking surfaced for either firm in available sources, and neither is an IP boutique of national scale — Direction IP is a plaintiff-side patent assertion shop, and Stubbs Alderton is a regional Southern California business firm. Caution is warranted on any headcount or revenue figure: the only third-party estimate located (Kona Equity, ~19 employees) is a scraped commercial data aggregator, not a verifiable disclosure.

IP litigation specialty

Direction IP Law's docket footprint is concentrated in assertion-side patent litigation on software, networking, and consumer-electronics technologies. Public filings show the firm representing plaintiffs in matters involving customizable/adaptive website functionality (Adaptive Avenue Associates; Recog IP LLC), network gateway and VoIP/enterprise communications equipment (Mod Stack LLC v. Edgewater Networks; Orostream LLC v. Syncplicity), wireless transmission techniques (Altair Logix LLC, where the parties identified "transmission techniques in wireless communication systems" as the expert field), and IoT/connected-home and mobile device security (IOT Innovations LLC, asserting patents covering video caching, personal digital gateways, and hierarchical mobile security). Stubbs Alderton's own practice description positions it as a business law firm "with particular expertise in intellectual property law" rather than a technology-specific IP litigation boutique, and its patent litigation work appears concentrated in a single large multidistrict campaign (below).

Side preference

Strongly plaintiff-side. The tracked data show 1 plaintiff-side appearance and 0 defendant-side appearances, and that skew is confirmed by independent docket review: essentially every publicly identifiable Direction IP Law matter is a patent-infringement suit filed on behalf of a plaintiff entity (Swirlate IP, Mod Stack, Orostream, Falkon Treasures, Karamelion, Altair Logix, Semantic Search Technologies, Magnacross, Adaptive Avenue, Recog IP, Turbocode, IOT Innovations). Several of these plaintiffs are widely classified by litigation-data providers as NPEs/PAEs — Unified Patents, for example, categorizes IOT Innovations LLC as an "NPE (Patent Assertion Entity)." A Delaware filing states that a Direction IP client retained the firm and local counsel on a contingency fee basis, consistent with a licensing-driven assertion model rather than a corporate defense practice. Stubbs Alderton likewise appeared for the patent plaintiff PersonalWeb Technologies in the N.D. Cal. MDL, so neither firm shows a meaningful operating-company defense practice in the available record.

Notable cases and outcomes

The single tracked case is IOT Innovations LLC v. SimpliSafe, Inc. (D. Mass., lead No. 1:23-cv-10352-RGS, filed Feb. 2023). It is worth noting a record discrepancy: the public docket entries for the consolidated SimpliSafe cases list plaintiff's counsel of record as Birnbaum & Godkin, LLP and Rozier Hardt McDonough PLLC, not Direction IP Law; David R. Bennett's pro hac vice appearance is documented in other matters (e.g., Turbocode LLC v. BLU Products, S.D. Fla. 2025). SimpliSafe's motion to dismiss was largely denied on the pleadings (Judge Richard G. Stearns declining to require element-by-element pleading and finding indirect-infringement allegations adequately pled), and three related cases were consolidated in May 2023. The litigation ended not on the merits but by a 30-day settlement order of dismissal entered September 25, 2023; no infringement finding, injunction, or public damages award was recorded, and the settlement terms are undisclosed. On the Stubbs Alderton side, the firm's most prominent public engagement was representing PersonalWeb Technologies, LLC as patent plaintiff in In re PersonalWeb Technologies, LLC Patent Litigation (N.D. Cal. MDL No. 5:18-md-02834, Judge Beth Labson Freeman) against Amazon and others on U.S. Patent Nos. 7,802,310 and 6,928,442. Public filings show the firm moved to withdraw as counsel in 2021–2022 and that the engagement became contested amid a California state-court receivership over the client — an unusual and publicly documented development, though it is not a merits result.

PTAB / IPR practice

No verifiable IPR, PGR, or CBM filing or defense practice was identified for either firm in the searches conducted. Given Direction IP's assertion-side model, any PTAB exposure would most likely be as counsel in defense of its plaintiffs' patents against institution petitions, and no such filings were located under the firm's or Bennett's name. This should be treated as an absence of evidence rather than a confirmed absence, and I would not state a filing volume without a supporting PTAB or Docket Navigator report.

Key partners / practice leaders

• David R. Bennett — the dominant figure in the tracked record (sole attorney credited on the tracked appearance) and the principal of Direction IP Law; routinely appears pro hac vice in Delaware, Texas, California, Massachusetts, and Florida patent cases for plaintiff-NPE clients.
• Steven G. Kalberg — Direction IP Law attorney appearing on N.D. Ill. patent filings.
• Michael A. Sherman, Jeffrey F. Gersh, and Wesley W. Monroe — Stubbs Alderton partners who served as lead counsel of record for PersonalWeb Technologies in the N.D. Cal. MDL.
• Mark D. Brutzkus — Stubbs Alderton partner listed in Super Lawyers for intellectual property litigation; note that Super Lawyers is a peer-rating directory, not an independent ranking of patent litigation results.

Roster, headcount, revenue, and any ranking claims beyond the above could not be grounded in a reliable public source and should be verified with the firms directly before use in a client-facing document.