When a multidistrict litigation (MDL) panel ruled against patent holder Droplets Inc. in December, it put the kibosh on Droplets’s efforts to move six patent infringement lawsuits back to the Eastern District of Texas. Droplets had moved to consolidate the suits in an MDL in Texas, but the Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation denied the request, because the cases were at different stages of litigation.
Even if the MDL gambit didn’t work for Droplets, it won’t be the last time patent litigators try the MDL move in the venue dance. The MDL panel, which traditionally hasn’t seen many patent cases, is assuming a greater role in patent litigation.The rise is the combined result of the America Invents Act’s limits on joinder and recent Federal Circuit case law making it easier to transfer cases out of the notoriously sticky Eastern District of Texas. More filings against individual defendants means more cases scattered to multiple jurisdictions and more district court judges potentially ruling on the same complex and technical patents. It all adds up to a sure recipe for pretrial consolidation as an MDL, said lawyers monitoring the trend.
