Vanguard Crest; Merchant & Gould

I'll verify the firm's profile before writing. Note the name string contains two entities — let me check both.

No results for "Vanguard Crest" — I'll flag that. Now verifying the case, the named attorney, firm size/offices, and PTAB activity.

Now checking firm size/offices, rankings, and PTAB volume.

Patent Litigation Practice Summary — Merchant & Gould P.C.

Note on the firm name. The tracked name string supplied is "Vanguard Crest; Merchant & Gould." I found no law firm, docket, or industry directory entry for "Vanguard Crest" — a web search returns nothing. Merchant & Gould P.C. is a real, long-established IP firm, and I have treated that as the subject here. I have not attributed any data to "Vanguard Crest," and the discrepancy should be resolved before this profile is used externally.

Firm overview. Merchant & Gould P.C. is a Minneapolis-headquartered intellectual property boutique founded in 1900, making it one of the oldest IP-only firms in the country. Public descriptions place it at roughly 90–100 attorneys across seven to nine offices, most consistently Minneapolis (HQ), Alexandria/Washington D.C. area, Denver, New York, Atlanta, Knoxville, Madison, Boston, Los Angeles and Seattle. The firm describes itself as "one of the largest intellectual property law firms in the United States," and Vault classifies it as an IP boutique with about 50 litigation-side professionals. It is not a BigLaw general-practice firm; it is a national IP specialist with a Midwestern cost structure. Chambers USA 2025 ranks the firm in Intellectual Property–Minnesota, with Tony Zeuli listed as Band 1. I found no AmLaw 100/200 placement, which is expected for a firm of this size.

IP litigation specialty. The firm's own litigation practice page emphasizes patent, trademark, copyright, trade secret and contract disputes across automotive, biotechnology, computer technology, semiconductor and software industries, plus Hatch-Waxman/ANDA litigation and Section 337 investigations at the ITC. Its Electrical & Software group cites work in transceivers and telecommunications hardware, semiconductors and wafer manufacturing systems, OLED displays, optical sensors, power systems and medical devices — a hardware-and-telecom-heavy docket rather than a pharma-centric or Wi-Fi-standard-essential focused one. Consistent with that, the single tracked matter is a glass-substrate/LCD display technology dispute.

Side preference. The tracked data is thin — one appearance, on the defense side, in a lead-attorney role — so no durable side preference can be inferred from the case list alone. Public records point to a genuinely mixed practice. On the plaintiff side, Merchant & Gould's own attorney materials credit an $8 million lost-profits jury verdict and injunction for August Technology and Rudolph Technologies against Camtek (D. Minn. 2009). On the defense side, the firm is defending HKC in the Corning glass-substrate matter, and it served as lead counsel for Leigh Rothschild, Rothschild Broadcast Distribution Systems, Display Technologies, Patent Asset Management and Meyler Legal in Valve Corp. v. Rothschild (W.D. Wash.) — i.e., it has represented high-volume patent assertion entities, not only operating companies. McPhail's own Law360 docket also shows defendant-side work for Ricoh USA. The fair characterization is a firm that takes both sides, including some NPE/PAE-side engagements.

Notable cases and outcomes. The tracked case, Corning Incorporated v. HKC Corp. et al., corresponds in public reporting to Corning's LCD glass-substrate campaign. The ITC instituted related Section 337 investigations (337-TA-1433, instituted January 2025, and 337-TA-1441, instituted March 2025) naming HKC, Caihong/Irico, Hisense, LG, TCL/CSOT, TTE and VIZIO as respondents. The proceedings resolved quickly rather than by adjudication: the ITC terminated the investigation as to HKC Corporation and HKC Overseas based on settlement on August 6, 2025, with VIZIO and LG Electronics later exiting on settlement, and Corning withdrawing certain asserted claims. On appeal, McPhail argued Ferring B.V. v. Watson Labs., 764 F.3d 1382 (Fed. Cir. 2014), which held that ANDA applicants may amend applications during litigation to avoid infringement — a plaintiff-side pharma win. One caveat: several large verdicts that circulate in searches under similar fact patterns (e.g., a $30 million retaining-wall verdict) belong to Carlson Caspers, a separate firm founded by a former Merchant & Gould managing partner, and should not be attributed to Merchant & Gould.

PTAB / IPR practice. The firm has a genuine post-grant practice but I could not find a public, firm-wide IPR/PGR filing count, so any volume figure would be unsupported. Individual capability is documented: USPTO PTAB filings list Donald McPhail (Reg. No. 35,811) as backup counsel on petitions, and his firm biography cites substantial IPR, post-grant review, reexamination and reissue experience alongside EPO oppositions. The firm's Alexandria office, expanded in April 2024 with five lateral IP attorneys from Oblon, McClelland, Maier & Neustadt, sits deliberately near the USPTO and appears intended to strengthen this capability.

Key partners. Donald R. McPhail (partner, Alexandria/D.C. area; 30+ years in IP litigation, admitted before the Federal Circuit, the sole named attorney in the tracked matter) is the most relevant contact. Other prominent IP litigators per the firm site and rankings include Tony Zeuli (Chambers USA 2025 Band 1, IP–Minnesota; patent, trademark and copyright disputes), Heather J. Kliebenstein (executive committee member and former litigation group chair, Minneapolis) and Jeffrey D. Blake, listed as a litigation group chair alongside Rachel Zimmerman Scobie.