Gibbons

I'll research the firm's profile and practice before writing the summary.

Gibbons (now FBT Gibbons LLP) — Patent Litigation Practice Summary

Prepared 14 September 2026

Firm overview. Gibbons P.C. was founded in 1926 and is headquartered at One Gateway Center in Newark, New Jersey, with additional offices in Trenton and Red Bank (NJ), New York, Philadelphia, Wilmington (Delaware), Washington, D.C., and West Palm Beach (Florida) — historically presented as eight offices. Sources differ on headcount over time (roughly 170–230 attorneys in recent years), and the firm describes itself as a Mid-Atlantic, middle-market practice rather than a national BigLaw firm; it has been ranked among the nation's top 200 firms by The American Lawyer. The most consequential recent development is structural: Frost Brown Todd and Gibbons completed a combination effective 1 January 2026, forming FBT Gibbons LLP — reported at approximately 800 lawyers across 25 offices, with Gibbons managing director Peter J. Torcicollo continuing in a leadership role and Chambers listing the combined firm for USA 2026. Legacy Gibbons practice groups and personnel, including the IP department, carried into the combined firm.

IP litigation specialty. IP is a core department rather than an ancillary one. The firm's own practice description covers the full patent, trademark, copyright, trade secret and unfair competition range across litigation, prosecution, licensing and transactions. Publicly ranked attorneys describe technical depth in communications and consumer electronics, semiconductors and materials, software and network-based systems, medical devices, and casino/gaming technologies, alongside a substantial life-sciences franchise grounded in New Jersey's pharmaceutical corridor — a focus the combined firm has formalized in a new Life Sciences industry team led by David E. De Lorenzi, with explicit emphasis on Hatch-Waxman and biologics work. IAM Patent 1000 has rated the practice at Gold Band in New Jersey (one of only three such firms in the state in 2021) and recognized individual attorneys in litigation, prosecution and transactions categories across many consecutive editions.

Side preference. The tracked record is one-sided: 0 plaintiff-side appearances against 5 defendant-side appearances. The firm works as defense-side patent litigation counsel — and in the Halozyme/Merck dispute, as the patent challenger at the PTAB — rather than as a plaintiff's-side enforcer for NPEs/PAEs. There is no tracked evidence of the firm prosecuting infringement claims for a patent monetization client. Role data shows the practice is used substantially as New Jersey local counsel (the most frequent role in the tracked record), supplemented by "counsel" and a smaller number of lead counsel engagements. Caveat: five tracked appearances is a small sample and likely understates the firm's total IP litigation volume; treat the side split as indicative of posture, not exhaustive.

Notable tracked matters. The most prominent is the Halozyme / Merck Sharp & Dohme dispute. Halozyme filed Halozyme, Inc. v. Merck Sharp & Dohme Corp. in the District of New Jersey (No. 2:25-cv-03179, filed 24 April 2025, assigned to Judge Esther Salas), asserting 15 patents covering MDASE hyaluronidase subcutaneous delivery technology against Merck's subcutaneous Keytruda/QLEX. Gibbons appeared for Merck alongside Dechert. The same dispute is tracked in the opposite direction as Merck Sharp & Dohme LLC v. Halozyme, Inc., reflecting Merck's parallel validity challenge at the PTAB (see below). The second matter is the Samsung / Maxell patent dispute, where Scott W. Breedlove is recorded as lead counsel for the defendant. Note a sourcing limitation: the widely reported Maxell-versus-Samsung litigation — including a $112 million jury verdict later overturned on JMOL before the Federal Circuit — was publicly litigated by DLA Piper and other firms, so the scope of Gibbons's specific role in the tracked Samsung/Maxell proceeding is not independently verifiable from the sources reviewed. I did not find verifiable public verdicts, settlements or Federal Circuit outcomes attributable to Gibbons itself in these matters.

PTAB / IPR practice and key partners. The tracked docket indicates genuine post-grant capability rather than occasional patent-office work. Merck/MSD (a Gibbons client in the related district court action) filed a large PGR campaign against Halozyme's patents beginning November 2024 — public reports describe petitions against roughly 10 to 14 Halozyme patents, with the PTAB instituting multiple proceedings (including PGR2025-00006, -00009, -00017, -00024, -00030, -00046 and -00052, all captioned Merck Sharp & Dohme LLC v. Halozyme, Inc.). Whether Gibbons drafted or argued those petitions is not confirmed by the sources reviewed; the firm's listed counsel is most clearly documented on the district court side. The department nevertheless publicly markets IPR, PGR, CBM review, ex parte reexamination and supplemental examination as part of its offering. Key figures, per the firm's site, IAM rankings and Chambers: David E. De Lorenzi (IP Department Chair; IAM-recognized for roughly 13 consecutive years; now leads FBT Gibbons' Life Sciences team), Charles H. Chevalier (IAM-ranked litigator; three tracked appearances, all as New Jersey local counsel), Thomas J. Bean (prosecution, licensing and post-grant procedures; IAM-ranked) and Michael V. Caracappa (recorded on the Halozyme/Merck district court docket; I was unable to confirm his current title from a firm-hosted source). Other IAM-ranked attorneys include Samuel H. Megerditchian, Robert E. Rudnick, Christopher H. Strate, Estelle J. Tsevdos, George M. Gould and George W. Johnston.

Verification notes: firm size, revenue and attorney counts vary by source and year and should not be treated as current. Rankings cited (AmLaw top 200, IAM Patent 1000 Gold Band, Chambers USA) come from firm-republished or third-party profile material; no ranking is asserted here that was not found in a cited public source.