Friday, April 2, 2010

Deliberate Copying, Litigation Conduct Warrant $10 Million Enhanced Damages Award

Plaintiffs' motion for enhanced damages was granted where (i) "[t]he evidence at trial clearly supports a finding that [defendants] deliberately copied [plaintiffs' product];" (ii) "[defendant] dragged its heels in investigating its potential liability under the patents and, in fact, did not even attempt to redesign its products until almost a year after the present lawsuit was filed;" (iii) "the record is replete with instances where Defendants pursued a course of conduct that had the effect of unduly burdening the Court with unnecessary matters and prolonging the litigation;" (iv) "claim construction was not a close call" and "[defendants'] defenses were weak, at best;" (v) "[defendants] continued to infringe for more than two years after learning of [plaintiffs'] patents;" (vi) "[defendants] sold infringing products for several years after it became aware of [plaintiffs'] patents [demonstrating] that [defendants] recklessly ignored an obvious risk;" and (vii) "[defendants'] employees admitted that they were offering a lower price to attract customers, and admitted that their prices could have been discounted as much as 50% off what [plaintiff] was offering."

Saint Gobain Autover USA, Inc. et al v. Xinyi Automobile Glass Co. et al., 1-06-cv-02781 (OHND March 31, 2010, Memorandum Opinion) (Lioi, J.)

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