McCarter & English

I'll research McCarter & English's IP litigation practice before writing.

McCarter & English, LLP — Patent Litigation Practice Summary

Firm overview. McCarter & English is a full-service Am Law 200 firm founded in 1845, headquartered in Newark, New Jersey (with a large Boston presence). Its own IP practice description references nine offices, spanning Boston, Hartford, Stamford, New York, Newark, East Brunswick, Philadelphia, Wilmington, and the DC metro area. It is not an IP boutique: Law.com/Law Journal data put the firm at 342–370 total lawyers, $334 million gross revenue, and #132 on the 2026 Am Law 200 (NLJ 500 rank 142). Chambers USA 2026 rates its IP group in Massachusetts (Band 3), Connecticut (Band 1), New Jersey (Band 2), and Delaware; IAM Patent 1000 recommends the team in five jurisdictions. Its IP group reports more than 100 IP lawyers and professionals, including roughly 65 patent lawyers, agents and technical specialists.

IP litigation specialty. The practice is bifurcated between life sciences and technology. On the pharma side, the firm's Delaware and New Jersey teams handle Hatch-Waxman and BPCIA work for innovator clients (the tracked docket is dominated by Novartis and Astellas ANDA/biosimilar matters), and Chambers/IAM sources describe Daniel Silver as a go-to Delaware lead/local counsel in complex life sciences disputes. On the technology side, the docket covers medical devices (Aerin Medical/Neurent, The Foundry), roof-imaging software (Xactware/Verisk v. EagleView), semiconductors and consumer electronics (Semisilicon v. inMusic), foldable-smartphone UI and multi-display technology (Multifold), networking/security (Network Security Technologies v. McAfee), and standards-adjacent wireless, video-coding and AI/ML work described in the firm's attorney profiles. The firm also cites mechanical, e-commerce, consumer-product and PKI/encryption experience.

Side preference. The tracked list is decisively plaintiff-side (29 plaintiff vs. 12 defendant appearances). The largest single block is representation of innovator pharmaceutical plaintiffs in Delaware — frequently as local or lead-local counsel alongside national trial firms — and a smaller set of patent-owner assertions against large technology companies (Multifold v. Google and v. Motorola Mobility; Network Security Technologies v. McAfee is the notable defendant-side entry). Note: the role tags (57 "local counsel," 13 "counsel," etc.) outnumber the 41 tracked appearances, so treat the side split as directional rather than exact. The practical profile is a patent-owner/plaintiff practice anchored in Delaware and New Jersey local-counsel work, not a defense-oriented operating-company shop.

Notable cases. Xactware Solutions v. EagleView Technologies is the most prominent verified matter: McCarter represented Xactware/Verisk in D.N.J. and, before the Federal Circuit, appealed four PTAB decisions, which were affirmed on March 6, 2019 (Nos. 2018-1053 et al., nonprecedential). The client ultimately lost a $125 million willful-infringement jury verdict (Sept. 2019), later augmented by roughly $375 million in enhanced damages; the parties settled in Nov. 2021 and the Federal Circuit appeal was dismissed. Multifold International v. Google / v. Motorola Mobility is the firm's highest-profile active assertion: eight patents on foldable/multi-display smartphone technology, with fact discovery closed and jury trials set for 2026 in D. Del., and parallel defendants' IPRs (IPR2025-00039/-00040/-00059) pending. On the defense-friendly side, the firm reported that Hologic's IPR requests against bioMérieux's asserted patents were denied in 2018. Silver's firm bio also cites a Delaware jury verdict for ArcherDX (Invitae) against Qiagen finding willful infringement, with roughly $4.7 million in royalties and lost profits, and Chambers credits the team with a District of Massachusetts jury verdict of validity for Inline.

PTAB / IPR practice. The firm markets a coordinated district-court/PTAB strategy across IPR, PGR and covered-business-method review. The clearest public scale indicator is the Xactware matter, in which the client filed some 13 IPR petitions against EagleView's patents (nine not instituted); the firm also appears as counsel in Unified Patents v. Novarad and in the Multifold IPRs. I found no public league-table or docket-statistics report quantifying the firm's annual IPR filing volume, so no figure should be asserted.

Key partners. Daniel M. Silver (Wilmington co-managing partner, executive committee; IAM Patent 1000 and Chambers-recognized; the dominant name in the tracked docket with 30 appearances) and Alexandra M. Joyce (24 appearances, including lead/local counsel in the Multifold campaigns) lead the Delaware patent practice. On the New Jersey/technology side, Scott S. Christie and Mark E. Nikolsky (both IAM Patent 1000; Nikolsky argued the Federal Circuit appeal in Xactware) are the most visible litigators, with Matthew A. Sklar also IAM-ranked. In Boston, Erik Paul Belt is Chambers Band 4 for patent and trademark litigation and a former president of the Boston Patent Law Association; Maria Laccotripe Zacharakis is Chambers Band 3 on the life sciences/prosecution side.