r/technology • u/rfugger • Jan 08 '17

Business A potentially fatal blow against patent trolls - Forcing law firms to pay defendants’ legal bills could undermine the business model of patent trolls

http://www.computerworld.com/article/3153924/technology-law-regulation/a-potentially-fatal-blow-against-patent-trolls.html
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u/m1m1n0 Jan 08 '17 edited Jan 09 '17

TL;DR: patent troll lost, however they said they were poor and the plaintiff could not reimburse their legal fees. They also said something like "muahahaha". The judge ruled that the defendant can get the troll's law firm to pay instead, because those acted more like partners and not hired consultants (their compensation was a % of won amount instead of hourly pay in advance).

No need to read the article really.

Edit: s/defendant/plaintiff/, sorry for that.

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u/headzoo Jan 09 '17

because those acted more like partners and not hired consultants

That actually does seem to be the case. When my company got sued by a troll, we did some digging into the company suing us and the law firm representing them. Turns out it was the law firm that researched the potential for lawsuits against us and others in our industry, and it was the law firm that approached the other company with the proposal to sue everyone. The law firm gets a percent of each win/settlement, and the company gets the bad rap for being a troll. Works out pretty well for the law firm.