Operating Company Litigation Went Up in Q3 2020 as Pure Design Patent Cases Spiked
October 28, 2020
As showcased in RPX’s latest quarterly report, one of the most notable district court trends in Q3 2020 was a massive spike in litigation asserting purely design patents—pushing the quarterly total up by 167%. However, even if we exclude cases asserting only design patents, the data show that patent litigation still went up in the third quarter compared to Q3 2019—with operating company litigation seeing a modest increase.
In the third quarter of 2020, operating companies added 276 defendants to campaigns, 1.1% more than in Q3 2019 (during which they added 273 defendants) but 31.2% less than in Q2 2020 (during which they added 401 defendants). Q3 2020 operating company filings fell short of the Q3 2016-2019 average by 24.8% and accounted for 34.7% of the patent litigation filed in Q3.
For their part, NPEs added 519 defendants to campaigns in the third quarter of 2020, or 5.5% more than in Q3 2019 (during which they added 492 defendants).
| Defendants Added | Change Compared to: | ||||
| Q3 2020 | Q3 2019 | Q3 2016-2019 Average | Q2 2020 | ||
| Operating Company | 276 | +1.1% | -24.8% | -31.2% | |
| NPE | 519 | +5.5% | +2.6% | -16.7% | |
| Total | 795 | +3.9% | -8.9% | -22.4% | |
In total, patent litigation still went up in the third quarter compared to the same period last year (again, excluding design patent-only cases): 795 defendants were added to patent campaigns in Q3 2020, an increase of 3.9% over Q3 2019 (during which 765 defendants were added), though filings decreased by 22.4% from Q2 2020 (during which 1,024 defendants were added). Third-quarter 2020 filing levels were below the Q3 2016-2019 average by 8.9%.
See RPX’s third-quarter review for more on this and other trends.
