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Most Litigious NPE's of All Time

By Peter Zura

Joff Wild over at the IAM Blog recently chatted with Dan McCurdy, chairman of PatentFreedom and CEO of Allied Security Trust, who is issuing a list of the most litigious non-practicing entities (aka "patent trolls") for the next issue of IAM Magazine.

Who are the most trigger-happy NPE patentees? According to McCurdy the most active companies in the U.S. are:

(1) Acacia Technologies (link) - 308 cases total, 239 cases since 2003;

(2) Rates Technology Inc. - 130 cases total, but only 38 cases since 2002;

(3) Millennium IP (link) - 99 cases total, 90 cases since 2003;

(4) Cygnus Telecommunications Technology - 69 cases total, 31 cases since 2003;

(5) General Patent Corp International (link) - 66 cases total, 36 cases since
2003;

(6) Plutus IP (link) - 59 cases total (all of those filed since 2003);

(7) Papst Licensing GmbH - 59 cases total, 31 cases since 2003;

(8) F&G Research - 56 cases total, 51 cases since 2003;

(9) Ronald A Katz Technology Licensing (link) - 54 cases total, 48 cases since 2003;

(10) Catch Curve (link) - 53 cases total, 36 cases since 2003.

Favorite NPE jurisdictions include:

1) E.D. Texas (surprise!)

2) N.D. California

3) C.D. California

4) S.D. New York

5) N.D. Illinois

Also, the research found that, for the 2007 year, 16.6% of all U.S. patent litigation involved NPEs. In 1997, the figure had stood at 2.4%.

See Joff Wild "Acacia tops troll litigaition league" (link)

Full post as published by Two-Seventy-One Patent Blog on September 16, 2008 (boomark / email).