“Apple has been ordered to pay $308.5 million to Personalized Media Communications (PMC) after a federal jury in Texas came to the conclusion that the latter’s patents were infringed,” reports Campbell Kwan in ZDNet.

“One of the patents in question is a ‘method of decrypting programming at a receiver station’, which the jury found Apple had used without permission for its digital rights management technology, FairPlay.”

“Despite PMC not being a creator or seller of any products, the court found that the company was not a patent troll as it licenses its own internally invented patent on an exclusive basis.”

“The $308.5 million figure is the culmination of royalties from when Apple first infringed the patents. In addition, the jurors have also directed that Apple pay a running royalty to PMC for when the patent is used in its products, which is based on the amount of sales of a product or service.”

Read the article.

“Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer has hired former Kirkland & Ellis partner Joseph Halloum to build out the firm’s upstart Silicon Valley office,” reports Roy Strom in Bloomberg Law’s Business & Practice.

“Halloum had been a partner since 2016 at Kirkland, where he worked on major transactions including the sales of Delphi Technologies, Del Frisco’s, and Smart & Final to private equity companies.”

“The hire adds depth to Freshfields’ Silicon Valley office, which opened in July with splash hires from firms including Davis Polk & Wardwell, Sidley Austin, and Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati. The firm signed a 10-year lease in a new office building in February, and currently lists 16 Silicon Valley lawyers on its website.”

Read the article.

“After losing its chief legal officer to booming biotech Moderna, Novartis has quickly found a replacement in an AbbVie veteran with both legal and complianhttps://generalcounselnews.com/wp-admin/post-new.php#edit_timestampce experience,” reports Angus Liu in Fierce Pharma’s Pharma.

“Karen Hale, currently AbbVie’s deputy general counsel, will join Novartis as its chief legal officer on May 15, the Swiss pharma said Monday.”

“In choosing Hale, Novartis has kept its top lawyer job in the hands of a woman after Shannon Klinger abruptly left for mRNA vaccine specialist Moderna. And it has picked someone with a very similar career path as her predecessor.”

“Hale joined the Illinois drugmaker back when it was still Abbott, coming from the law firm Sidley & Austin in 1997—and she’s kept her pharma career within the company since. Before starting her current stint, Hale served as AbbVie’s chief ethics & compliance officer for six years.”

Read the announcement.

Akerman LLP, a top 100 U.S. law firm, is pleased to announce the expansion of its Intellectual Property Practice Group with the addition of Jeffrey Armstrong and Benjamin Urban in Chicago. Armstrong and Urban bring with them a broad range of experience in intellectual property law, including patents, trademarks, unfair competition, copyrights, and trade secrets.

Armstrong has litigated patent infringement and trade secret matters in federal district courts, authored briefs in patent matters at the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit and the United States Supreme Court, prepared and prosecuted patent applications in the United States Patent and Trademark Office and patent offices around the world, and represented clients in post-grant proceedings at the Patent Trial and Appeals Board. In addition to his prosecution and litigation practice, has also authored legal opinions regarding patent, trademark, trade secret, unfair competition, and copyright issues, assisted clients with licensing patents and patent portfolios, and represented clients in trademark oppositions at the Trademark Trial and Appeals Board.

Urban focuses his practice on patent prosecution before the USPTO as well as patent offices worldwide. He has extensive experience in consumer electronics and software technologies having successfully prosecuted over 500 patent applications to issuance in these areas. Through these efforts, he has helped a leading consumer electronics manufacturer build its patent portfolio more than tenfold. He also has significant experience in telecommunications, web-conferencing, robotics, and online gaming, among other technologies.

Houston lawyer named among top young civil litigators in Texas in 2021 legal listing

HOUSTON – Erin Bullard, a trial lawyer with Houston-based Bissinger, Oshman & Williams LLP, has been selected among the top young lawyers in Texas for 2021.

Bullard was recognized in the prestigious Texas Rising Stars legal guide based on her civil litigation work on behalf of plaintiffs. Each year, Rising Stars recognizes no more than 2.5 percent of lawyers in the state.

Bullard represents corporate clients and individuals in a wide range of complex civil litigation, including claims of covenants not to compete, trade secrets, financial fraud, breach of fiduciary duty, breach of contract, fraudulent transfer, and negligence.

She earned her law degree from Texas A&M University School of Law and holds a Master of Laws degree in Energy, Environment and Natural Resources Law from the University of Houston Law Center. She is a former litigation analyst for a forensic accounting firm and judicial intern to Judge Rose Vela at the Texas 13th Court of Appeals.

Rising Stars recognizes the state’s most accomplished attorneys age 40 or younger or who have been in practice for 10 years or less. It is based on lawyer nominations, peer review and independent research. Rising Stars is a companion to the prestigious Super Lawyers guide to the top attorneys in the state. The Super Lawyers rating service is part of Thomson Reuters.

Lyons & Simmons co-founder honored for commitment to justice for injury victims

DALLAS – Chris Simmons, co-founder of Dallas-based trial firm Lyons & Simmons, has earned recognition once again as one of the Top 100 Up-and-Coming attorneys in the state as selected by the prestigious Texas Rising Stars legal guide.

This is the fifth consecutive year Simmons has been listed among the Top 100 young lawyers in the state regardless of practice focus, and he has been recognized on the Rising Stars list for his personal injury work every year since 2014. The annual peer review guide honors the best lawyers age 40 or younger or those in practice less than 10 years.

Also honored in the 2021 guide for his personal injury work is associate Stephen Higdon. This is his third year to be selected by Rising Stars, which recognizes just 2.5 percent of eligible lawyers in the state each year.

Simmons’ recognition is based upon a proven record of obtaining outstanding results in cases tried before judges, juries and arbitrators involving life-altering personal injury, wrongful death and “bet-the-company” business disputes throughout Texas and across the country. His work in high-stakes, complex litigation has also earned recognition in Best Lawyers in America, D Magazine’s Best Lawyers in Dallas, and Lawdragon 500 Leading Plaintiff Consumer Lawyers, and has earned him a Professional Excellence Award from Texas Lawyer magazine.

Higdon’s practice at Lyons & Simmons focuses on personal injury and complex business litigation. He has extensive courtroom experience, handling a wide range of civil litigation at both the trial and appellate levels. He is a graduate of Texas Tech University School of Law.

Texas Rising Stars is a companion guide to Texas Super Lawyers, which is owned by Thomson Reuters.

Buchalter is pleased to announce the arrival of new Shareholder William J. (“Bill”) Keeler, Jr. Keeler joins in Portland as the newest addition to the Firm’s growing Tax & Estate Planning Practice Group. Licensed in California and Oregon, Bill has extensive experience representing families, individuals, and trustees in various estate and trust disputes anywhere on the West Coast.

Keeler focuses his practice on all matters involving estates, trusts, and conservatorships, and has been designated an expert witness in trust, estate and conservatorship litigation as well as in related tax and professional negligence cases. He has also served as a mediator for trust, estate and conservatorship disputes bringing extensive knowledge of estate planning and trust administration, as well as practical experience as trial counsel to settle cases.

Keeler taught Estate Planning at California State University, Fresno, sharing his considerable knowledge and experience with students for over a decade. He has since lectured extensively for Continuing Education of the Bar, the National Business Institute, and addressed numerous Bar Associations, Estate Planning Councils, and estate planning professionals. Keeler has also served as judge pro tem in the probate departments of the Fresno County Superior Court, and the Orange County Superior Court.

Bradley Arant Boult Cummings LLP is pleased to announce that T. Sky Woodward, a partner in the firm’s Washington office, has been appointed by Maryland Gov. Lawrence J. Hogan, Jr. to the Maryland State Board of Elections.

The mission of the Maryland State Board of Elections is to ensure compliance with the requirements of Maryland and federal election laws by all persons involved in the process. The board is made up of five members who serve four-year terms and represent both principal political parties — three of the majority and two of the minority party. The members are appointed by the governor, with the advice and consent of the Maryland Senate.

Woodward represents clients in complex legal matters, including class actions, environmental, commercial, and constitutional litigation. She provides risk mitigation counseling to her real estate industry clients. Her business clients have spanned a variety of industries, including commercial and multifamily real estate developers and property management companies, financial services companies, and product manufacturers.

Woodward previously served as a member of the Maryland Appellate Courts Judicial Nominating Commission, to which she was appointed by Gov. Hogan. She serves on the board of directors of the Helping Up Mission in Baltimore, as vice president of the Parish Council at Church of the Nativity in Baltimore County, Maryland, and is the past president of Maryland Defense Counsel, Inc. (MDC), the statewide organization of trial lawyers who devote their practices to defending business in civil litigation.

Hanzo, a company known for its pioneering technology in dynamic web content preservation from enterprise collaboration applications and complex websites, today announced support for Slack Plus with their purpose-built discovery solution, Hanzo Hold for Slack.

Hanzo enables targeted collections and rapid access to discovery insights to corporate legal and HR teams. Support for Slack Plus offers flexibility and a user-friendly solution that empowers internal teams to do early case assessments and efficiently make key strategic case decisions.

What corporate legal teams can do with Hanzo Hold to manage their Slack Plus discovery workflows:

– Make sense of the data. Slack Plus exports are produced in complex and difficult-to-read JSON file formats. Now you can easily upload these files to Hanzo Hold for processing and analysis, avoiding the need to build your own parser and database.

– Narrow the scope. Slack Plus exports can only be limited by date range—leaving a lot of data in the pool. Hanzo enables users to extract content automatically based on defined matter scope, including relevant date range, custodians, and/or channels to reduce data volumes.

– Get all of the necessary data. Slack exports include message content and links to attached files, but not the files themselves. Hanzo Hold augments Slack Plus exports by recognizing these links for messages in scope for the matter and directly collecting relevant files and attachments.

– Rapidly glean insights. Leverage the robust search capabilities for investigation and early case assessment to gain immediate access to relevant content, and view in context as it appears in Slack.

– Precisely export Slack data in a review-ready format. Export exactly the right data for review, without the need for subsequent culling, processing, or complicated data conversion—saving time and downstream cost.

Houston, March 23, 2021 – Five Texas-based attorneys with Chamberlain Hrdlicka have been named to the 2021 Texas Rising Stars by Super Lawyers Magazine, including Jarrod B. Martin, Kathryn “Kelly” Shields and Justin E. VandenBout in Houston as well as F. Matthew “Matt” Flores and Jaime Vasquez in San Antonio. Part of the national Super Lawyers rating service, Texas Rising Stars recognizes the best attorneys age 40 or younger, or who have been practicing for 10 years or less. Each year, no more than 2.5 percent of the lawyers in the state receive this honor.

Flores focuses his practice on probate and fiduciary litigation, representing trustees, executors, beneficiaries, individuals, and business entities in the areas of estates, trusts, contested guardianships, and other related litigation. He also assists clients in the areas of estate planning, estate and trust administration, and closely held business succession planning. He is Board Certified in Estate Planning & Probate Law by the Texas Board of Legal Specialization. Flores graduated from the Texas A&M University with a Bachelor of Business Administration degree. He obtained his law degree from the University of Missouri School of Law and earned a Master of Laws degree in Estate Planning from the University of Miami School of Law. He’s been named to Best Lawyers in America 2021 – “Ones to Watch” and 2021 San Antonio’s Rising Stars by San Antonio Scene Magazine.

Martin has more than a decade of national litigation experience with a focus on restructuring and bankruptcy. He has practiced in both federal and state courts across the country, including time at both the U.S. Department of Justice and the U.S. Bankruptcy Courts, representing a variety of clients, including bankruptcy trustees, creditors, and corporate and high net-worth debtors, helping them through their bankruptcy and beyond. He has a wealth of experience in restructuring matters affecting energy companies and has represented creditors in some of the largest oil and gas bankruptcies filed in Texas. He is also a Subchapter V Trustee appointed by the Department of Justice under the Small Business Reorganization Act of 2019, supervising eligible, financially distressed businesses navigating the streamlined and expedited debt restructuring process. Martin received his bachelor’s degree from UCLA and his J. D. from The University of Miami School of Law. He’s been named to Texas Rising Stars for three consecutive years since 2019.

Shields is a litigation attorney who maintains a diverse litigation practice, representing clients in probate and fiduciary litigation, labor and employment litigation, complex commercial litigation, and arbitration. She has successfully represented both plaintiffs and defendants in federal and state courts in a variety of cases including will contests, trust disputes, fraud, breach of fiduciary duty, FLSA, Title VII, ADA/ADEA, contractual disputes, and construction disputes. Shields graduated magna cum laude from Washington and Lee University with a bachelor’s degree in business administration and psychology. Shields then graduated with honors from the University of Texas School of Law. She was named to 2021 Best Lawyers in America – “Ones to Watch.”

VandenBout is a trial lawyer who maintains a nationwide litigation practice with an emphasis on commercial litigation and complex insurance coverage litigation. He has successfully represented both Plaintiffs and Defendants in federal and state courts throughout the United States in matters ranging from intellectual property disputes, catastrophic personal injury, products liability, professional liability, construction, and breach of contract matters. He has trial experience in a variety of cases, including business partnership disputes, personal injury, property damage, intellectual property, and commercial litigation. In connection with his representation of claimants, he has been successful in collecting over $225 million in matters throughout the United States. VandenBout graduated from the University of Texas at Austin and holds a law degree from the South Texas College of Law. He is a Texas Bar Foundation Life Fellow, granted to only the top 1/3 of 1% of lawyers in Texas. VandenBout’s skill and advocacy on behalf of clients has consistently earned him recognition as one of the top lawyers in Texas in the areas of commercial litigation and insurance coverage. He’s been named to Texas Rising Stars for six consecutive years since 2016, “Leading Lawyer in Texas” by Leaders in Law and “Top Lawyer in Houston” by H Texas Magazine.

Vasquez concentrates his practice on federal, state, and international tax controversy matters. He has counseled clients in tax litigation matters, handling cases before the United States Tax Court, United States District Court, and the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. He is Board Certified in Tax Law by the Texas Board of Legal Specialization. Vasquez is also a Certified Public Accountant (CPA) and earned his undergraduate and Master of Accounting degrees from the University of Virginia McIntire School of Commerce, his law degree from University of Texas School of Law, and his Master of Laws in Taxation from New York University. He’s been named to Texas Rising Stars for eight consecutive years, since 2014. He was also named “Outstanding Lawyer” by San Antonio Business Journal and “Lawyer of the Year” for San Antonio in Litigation & Controversy – Tax in 2019 by Best Lawyers in America. He’s been listed on Best Lawyers in America for the past three years.

Lewis Roca Rothgerber Christie LLP has launched a complete rebrand that includes a new visual identity, website and shortened brand name, Lewis Roca. The rebrand reflects the firm’s client experience focus that is the foundation of its culture and approach to service delivery.

Lewis Roca, founded more than a century ago, was formed after Lewis and Roca combined with Rothgerber, Johnson & Lyons in 2013 and with Christie Parker & Hale in 2016. The rebrand fortifies the rich histories of the legacy firms under a strong, contemporary brand.

Experience Amplified, now in its third year, is a rigorous client experience program benchmarked and measured on a regular basis to ensure clients are receiving optimal service and value. Lewis Roca incorporates the Net Promoter Score tool, widely adopted by Fortune 500 companies. For more information on the program, visit www.lewisroca.com/experience.

Bradley Arant Boult Cummings LLP is pleased to announce that six attorneys across the firm’s Dallas and Houston offices have been named by Super Lawyers as Texas Rising Stars for 2021 for their work in a wide range of practice areas.

Bradley Dallas Office Managing Partner Richard A. Sayles added, “We congratulate our Dallas and Houston lawyers who have earned this recognition as among the top young attorneys in Texas. Their knowledge and skill set are assets to the firm and to our clients and will continue to be as we expand our capabilities in Texas.”

Bradley attorneys honored by Texas Rising Stars for 2021 include:

Dallas

• Samuel T. Acker, partner (Business Litigation)
• Matthew J. Agnew, senior attorney (Health Care)

Houston

• Mary Elizondo Frazier, partner (Business Litigation)
• Melissa Gutierrez, associate (Consumer Law)
• Ryan T. Kinder, partner (Business Litigation)
• Philip J. Morgan, associate (Civil Litigation: Defense)

Rising Stars honorees – who must be 40 years old or younger or in practice no more than 10 years – are selected by Super Lawyers through independent research, peer nominations and an evaluation by a blue-ribbon advisory board. No more than 2.5% of lawyers in Texas are honored each year. Distributed to attorneys and ABA-accredited law school libraries, the Texas Rising Stars lists also are published in Texas Super Lawyers Magazine – Rising Stars and Texas Monthly magazine. Super Lawyers is published by Thomson Reuters.

Ball Janik LLP, a construction defect and property damage law firm with offices in Florida and Oregon, is pleased to announce that Doug Stanford, Jr. has joined the firm’s Orlando office. Stanford is a real estate attorney in the Construction Defect practice, strengthening Ball Janik’s continual commitment to its clients.

Stanford focuses his legal practice on representing residential owners in the pursuit of complex construction defect claims. Prior to joining the firm, Stanford spent his career handling complex construction defect matters on behalf of owners throughout Northeast Florida. Stanford has significant experience in appellate matters focused on pursuing justice on behalf of owners in complex construction matters, including first-party property damage claims, contract disputes, and failure of real estate sellers to disclose latent defects.

Stanford is a member of The Florida Bar Appellate Practice and the Real Property, Probate & Trust Sections. He received his J.D. from the Florida Coastal School of Law, and his bachelor’s degree from Georgia State University.

“Thanks to the pandemic, it’s been a year since lawyers were forced to leave the comforts of their offices and adapt to working from home on a semi-permanent basis. The thought of working from home used to be seen as a somewhat of a luxury, but after doing it for 12 months straight, it’s become simply exhausting. When your home is your office and your office is your home, the concept of work-life balance is no more, especially for lawyers who thought they were always ‘on’ even before the coronavirus crisis. One firm has come up with an amazing solution for this problem,” writes Staci Zaretsky in Above the Law’s Biglaw.

“Orrick — a firm that brought in $1,158,537,000 in 2019 gross revenue, placing in at No. 31 in the most recent Am Law 100 rankings — is offering everyone (i.e., staff, associates, of counsel, career associates, and partners) the chance to truly ‘unplug.’ The firm will credit 40 hours of bonus-eligible time for everyone to sit back, relax, and stop doing work.”

Read the article.

“Maryland lawmakers approved a $577 million funding bill that would grant money to the state’s four Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU) following a nearly 15-year lawsuit declaring unfair funding and discrimination to these institutions,” reports Khalida Volou in WUSA9’s Education.

“The Maryland House of Delegates approved the notion voting 120-14 on Wednesday. Next, the bill is making its way to Gov. Larry Hogan’s desk for final approval.”

“Now, if the bill is signed, Bowie State, Coppin State, Morgan State and University of Maryland Eastern Shore will all be granted funds from the $577 million for the next 10 years starting in 2023.”

“This will also end a 2006 lawsuit filed by the NAACP that accused Maryland of giving more money and unique academic programs to ‘traditionally white institutions.'”

Read the article.

“Post-employment restrictions, including noncompete agreements, have become an increasingly popular tool for protecting business investments; confidential information; client, customer and employee relationships; and goodwill,” write Stephen W. Aronson, Natale V. Di Natale, Jean E. Tomasco, Abby M. Warren and Kayla N. West in The National Law Review.

“At the same time, legislators increasingly have focused their attention on limiting an employer’s ability to impose such restrictions, as has the new Biden administration.”

“Noncompete agreements are typically governed by state law. Most states try to balance employers’ interests in protecting their business with employees’ interests in earning a living. Recently, the trend has been for states to place restrictions on employers’ ability to impose post-employment restrictions (most recently in the District of Columbia). New legislation prohibits the use of restrictive covenants for low-wage employees and other specific types of employees, as well as restricting use where it may not be reasonable. That said, development of state laws on noncompete agreements varies greatly; while Connecticut’s noncompete laws stem mainly from court decisions, Rhode Island and Massachusetts have passed robust noncompete statutes in recent years …”.

For a summary read the article.

Bradley Arant Boult Cummings LLP is pleased to announce that seven of the firm’s partners have been elected as Fellows of the American Bar Foundation (ABF). T. Michael Brown, William C. Byrd, Frank M. Caprio, E. Mabry Rogers, David Roth, Charles Stewart and T. Sky Woodward have been inducted into the global honor society.

The ABF Fellows is a global honorary society that recognizes attorneys, judges, law faculty and legal scholars whose public and private careers have demonstrated outstanding dedication to the highest principles of the legal profession and to the welfare of their communities. Members are nominated by their peers and elected by the ABF board. The Fellows support the research of the ABF and sponsor seminars and events of direct relevance to the legal profession. The independent, nonprofit ABF seeks to advance the understanding and improvement of law through research projects on the most pressing issues facing the legal system in the United States and the world.

Almost 60 Bradley attorneys across all the firm’s offices have been inducted as ABF Fellows. Membership in the Fellows is limited to one percent (1%) of lawyers licensed to practice in each jurisdiction. ABF Fellows hail from nearly 40 countries and hold a wide variety of influential roles.

About Bradley
Bradley combines skilled legal counsel with exceptional client service and unwavering integrity to assist a diverse range of corporate and individual clients in achieving their business goals. With offices in Alabama, Florida, Mississippi, North Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and the District of Columbia, the firm’s nearly 550 lawyers represent regional, national and international clients in various industries, including banking and financial services, construction, energy, healthcare, life sciences, manufacturing, real estate, and technology, among many others.

“FIGS Inc., a fast-growing medical apparel retailer, has hired Tesla Inc.‘s former general counsel, Todd Maron, as its first legal chief,” reports Brian Baxter in Bloomberg Law’s US Law Week.

“FIGS, which is battling a key competitor in court and reportedly mulling a potential initial public offering this year at a valuation approaching $4 billion, hired Maron last month to lead a growing legal group.”

“FIGS was called the ‘Warby Parker of scrubs’ in a 2018 Wall Street Journal story that cited the $100 million in revenue earned by the company through its aggressive marketing campaigns and direct-to-consumer business model.”

Read the article.

“Climate change policies at the state and federal levels will have significant impacts on natural gas companies and their customers. On the one hand, there is pressure on companies to maintain safe and reliable service – on the other, the push for net-zero carbon emissions by 2050. These competing objectives will have notable effects on how companies conduct their long-term planning to maintain system reliability while avoiding potential stranded costs and safeguarding ratepayers. This post and subsequent updates will focus on how federal and some state regulators are addressing the issues,” report Jared S. des Rosiers, Kayla J. Grant, Paul K. Connolly, Jr., Randall S. Rich and Valerie L. Green in The National Law Review.

Read the article.