Our first runners-up for Litigator of the Week in the cycle that ended just before the holiday are Kurt Pankratz and Tom O’Brien of Baker Botts who brought home a $210 million trade secrets verdict for client Computer Sciences Corp. After a seven-day trial, federal jurors in Dallas found earlier this month that Tata Consultancy Services used improper means to access CSC’s confidential, proprietary and trade secret information and source code to develop competing software to administer and process annuities and life insurance premiums in the United States. Jurors awarded CSC $70 million in damages and $140 million in exemplary damages. The trial team also included Susan Kennedy and James Williams of Baker Botts and co-counsel Justin Sumner of Sumner Schick.

Runners-up honors also go to Jeff Wall, Dustin Guzior and Judd Littleton of Sullivan & Cromwell who secured a ruling earlier this month from the Delaware Supreme Court that upheld the firm’s win shielding client Bayer AG from talc product liability claims stemming from its $14.2 billion acquisition of certain Merck product lines in 2014. Merck claimed its liabilities tied to products sold prior to the deal’s closing were time-limited and transferred to Bayer in October 2021. But the Chancery Court judge below found the underlying purchase agreement “clearly and unambiguously” said otherwise. Wall argued the appeal before the Supreme Court, which heard the matter en banc. The court issued its decision affirming Bayer’s win below just two weeks after arguments. The S&C team worked alongside Bayer in-house litigation counsel Sarah Heineman.