Market Sector Update: More NPEs Swerve into Automotive Sector

A breakdown of NPE district court filing trends by market sector shows a marked increase in litigation hitting certain industries in Q3 2021 compared to that same quarter last year. In particular, NPE litigation targeting the Automotive sector increased by 182%, with filings also rising in sectors like Mobile Communications and Devices (up by 133%), Consumer Electronics and PCs (up by 71%), and Financial Services (up by 48%). Sectors with less NPE litigation compared to Q3 2020 included Biotech and Pharma (with a single defendant added) and Networking (down by 38%).

While the number of defendants sued in Automotive campaigns remains lower than other sectors, the litigation activity of several well-known plaintiffs in this space reflects sustained NPE interest.

Among the notable Automotive litigation filed in the third quarter was a new campaign launched by plaintiff K.Mizra LLC in early July targeting connected vehicle services, asserting a patent that it acquired in 2019 from Brian Yates’s Spectrum Patents, Inc. Several existing campaigns also saw new litigation in Q3—including the automotive navigation campaign kicked off in January by IP Edge LLC plaintiff Typhoon IP LLC, which added three more cases targeting infotainment systems with GPS features in late August. Both new complaints assert patents acquired from Empire Technology Development LLC, a subsidiary of Allied Inventors Management, LLC (AIM), in December 2019. Additionally, inventor-controlled NPE Blitzsafe Texas, LLC sued a host of other infotainment system makers—here focusing on features related to mobile device integration and media playback—in early August, just the latest round of a campaign started back in 2015. Also alleging infringement through infotainment systems was MicroPairing Technologies LLC, which added two more automakers to the campaign that it began in October 2020.

In addition, some familiar plaintiffs pivoted their existing campaigns to encompass automotive technology in Q3. Those litigants included prolific inventor and frequent filer Leigh M. Rothschild, whose Display Technologies, LLC brought a new round of cases that included one automaker—once again, with infringement allegations targeting infotainment systems, these ones hit over their support of Bluetooth media playback. Also steering into the auto sector was private equity-backed NPE Fundamental Innovation Systems International LLC (FISI), which had previously focused its USB charging campaign asserting former BlackBerry patents on device makers, but in August sued a group of automakers and parts suppliers over the provision of USB media ports and vehicles equipped with such hardware.

See RPX’s third-quarter review for more on this and other trends impacting patent litigation and the patent marketplace.