Legal Pad

Fenwick Leads the Green Way With Electric Vehicle Charging Station

[Amy Miller]

Fenwick & West’s parking lot in downtown Mountain View just got a little greener, thanks to two new electric vehicle charging stations unveiled Tuesday.

Fenwick is the first law firm in the U.S. to install the stations, said Julie O’Loughlin, senior director of operations and facilities. And they’re just part of the firm’s long-term strategy to help the environment.

“The stations have been on our to-do list for years,” O’Loughlin said. “We’d like to think we’re a little ahead of the curve.”

Will the Stock Market Yo-Yo Discourage IPOs?

[Petra Pasternak]

The stock market’s recent see-sawing is enough to make a securities lawyer queasy.

Horace Nash, the head of Fenwick & West’s securities group, starts his mornings with a cup of coffee and an eye on the markets. It’s felt good to watch the economy stabilize this year, he noted, to see the companies coming off the sidelines and filing for IPOs after a dry 2008-09. Tuesday morning, though, with the market opening down again, Nash’s coffee tasted more bitter than usual. “Every time the market drops, you wonder, is this the end? What’s this market going to do? Is it a little hiccup, or is it a sign that things have changed somehow? What’s it going to do to my deal? What’s it going to do to my client?” Nash said.

Fortunately, clients haven’t gotten spooked yet: Nash says no deals have been cancelled, but a number of companies in the pipeline are trying to decide whether to go public in June or September. He says Fenwick has three IPOs on file with the SEC, and two others lined up behind them. “I’m sure some IPOs that a couple of months ago people thought would be spring IPOs will turn out to be fall IPOs,” Nash said. “There’s that much more uncertainty.”

Nash isn’t too bullish on the economy — “It’s not robust, but it’s not in terrible shape” — but he’s confident it’ll take more than a Dow dip below 10,000 to rattle the battle-worn: “Our clients have lived through a very difficult economic environment and they’re pretty darned tough and resilient,” Nash said. “They’ll be fine in the next six months being tough and resilient.”

Fenwick Lawyer Trolls For Change at Federal Circuit

It was a good Friday for Fenwick & West’s Charlene Morrow, who got client Hewlett-Packard out of a jam and caused the Federal Circuit — the high court of patent case appeals — to move the needle a little toward companies who want to squash patent trolls before they get started.

Morrow was arguing that a declaratory judgment action her client HP had filed against patent holder Acceleron shouldn’t have been tossed by the district court in Delaware. What happened is that Acceleron sent a vaguely threatening letter to HP about a patent it had (the letter can be read, along with the opinion, here: (.pdf )

HP filed an action in Delaware, asking the court to rule that it didn’t infringe on Acceleron’s patents and that the patents were invalid. But Acceleron protested that it hadn’t even really threatened HP, so there was no reason to judge anything declaratorily. “At the time HP filed its complaint, Acceleron could not have asserted its rights in the ’021 patent against HP because it had not even determined if it had a basis to assert the patent against HP,” Acceleron’s lawyers from Alston & Bird wrote. Delaware Judge Sue Robinson agreed and tossed the suit.

Then the reversal, suggesting trolls have less appeal …

Amazon's Fenwick Lawyers Carve a Nook: Suing Barnes & Noble

Barnes & Noble’s e-book reader, cutely named the Nook, is now the target of a lawsuit (.pdf) alleging trade-secret theft, filed by a small Fremont company called Spring Design Inc. Interestingly, Spring Design has hired Fenwick & West’s Lynn Pasahow, the very same lawyer who does most of the IP work for Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble’s primary competitor. Seems like Amazon would be pleased with a lawsuit that kindles a little trouble for the newly unveiled Nook, right?

Legal Pad caught up with Fenwick partner David Hadden, who’s working with Pasahow on the case, and he said that Amazon had absolutely nothing to do with the lawsuit. It’s not funding it; Spring Source is paying for its own lawyers — and not on contingency fee. It’s just coincidence, he said. Pasahow and Hadden have battled Barnes & Noble when they sued the book company with Amazon.com’s questionable one-click patent.

Hadden said that Spring Design shared its plans for an e-book reader with Barnes & Noble. It was surprised when the Nook came out with all the same features, including the famous interactive dual screen design that has given the Nook an edge on Amazon’s much-hyped e-book gizmo, Hadden said.

— Zusha Elinson

Fenwick Sued for Fraudulently Claiming Fraud

A tiny and slightly fishy smelling Web site called Rent a Cert is fuming at lawyers from Fenwick & West for shutting it down. Now, a federal judge will decide the outcome of the fight.

Rent a Cert had caused a stir in the tech world with its offer to “rent out” Cisco certified engineers and technicians as a way to boost the profile of middleman companies that sell Cisco products. These middle men need a certain amount of certified professionals to qualify as “Gold” or “Silver” Cisco partners. Critics said Rent A Cert was juking the system by pimping out credentials, while the company defended itself as a legitimate recruiting agency.

Cisco hired Fenwick late last year to crush the Web site in the way that big firm lawyers do. Fenwick sent a lawyer letter to Rent A Cert’s Internet host asking it to take down the site. The Fenwick lawyers wrote that Rent A Cert was committing fraud with its scheme and trademark infringement by using the Cisco logo.

The plot thickens … after the jump: