Huang v. Nephos Inc.

Background

Xiaohua Huang, proceeding without a lawyer, owns U.S. Patent Nos. 6,744,653 and 6,999,331. The patents generally concern ternary content-addressable memory technology used in the semiconductor-chip industry. Huang accused Nephos Inc.’s chips of infringing specified claims of both patents.

Nephos moved to strike Huang’s fourth set of infringement contentions, dismiss the action with prejudice, and award attorney’s fees. The motion followed earlier warnings and a prior order striking Huang’s third set of contentions and giving him another opportunity to amend them.

Analysis

The court held that the fourth set of contentions still violated Patent Local Rules 3-1(c), 3-1(d), and 3-1(e).

Under Rule 3-1(c), Huang had to identify specifically where and how each limitation—the individual requirement of a patent claim—appeared in each accused product. The court found that his claim charts mainly described his own patent figures and generally asserted that those figures appeared in the accused products. They did not tie specific features of specific Nephos products to the language of the asserted claims or provide meaningful supporting product information.

Under Rule 3-1(d), Huang had to identify any direct infringement and describe the acts by which Nephos allegedly contributed to or induced that infringement. The court found that his disclosure, which named Amazon as an example of an induced party, used only general boilerplate and did not identify any specific act by Nephos.

Under Rule 3-1(e), Huang had to state whether each claim limitation was allegedly present literally or under the doctrine of equivalents, a legal theory that treats a product feature as infringing even when it is not identical if it performs substantially the same function in substantially the same way to achieve substantially the same result. The court found that Huang’s disclosure focused on possible future products and made a blanket assertion rather than analyzing each limitation for the products currently accused.

Disposition

The court concluded that Huang had received multiple opportunities and repeated guidance but still had not provided compliant infringement contentions. It found good cause to impose the severe sanction of striking the contentions.

The court therefore granted Nephos’s motion to strike Huang’s infringement contentions and dismissed the action with prejudice. The court denied Nephos’s request for attorney’s fees for now, without prejudice to renewal after any appeal and affirmance. Judgment was to follow.