Christa Anderson

Cases of Note

Oracle America, Inc. v. Google Inc.: We are representing Google in a high-stakes patent and copyright infringement suit brought by the Oracle Corporation, a battle between two of Silicon Valley’s most respected and powerful companies with billions of dollars at stake. Oracle’s complaint alleges that Google’s Android mobile operating technology infringes Oracle's Java patents. Oracle bought the Java programming language through its acquisition of Sun Microsystems in January 2010. An expert for Oracle estimated Google would owe Oracle between $1.4 billion and $6 billion in damages if it was found liable of infringement. Disputing that figure, our team asserts that the patents are invalid and not infringed and that users of the Android platform have a license to any patents in the case.

Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation v. Semiconductor Company: We represented a leading semiconductor company in a patent trial brought in the Eastern District of Texas. The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) asserted patent infringement claims against more than a dozen of the world's leading technology companies, including our client. CSIRO contended the defendants' Wi-Fi products infringed on CSIRO's patent, and sought nine to ten figure royalty payments. A week into the jury trial, we reached a favorable settlement with CSIRO, and the remaining parties also settled favorably.

Middle East Distributor v. Fashion Retailer: In a suit raising novel issues of franchise law, we represented a national fashion retailer in a breach of contract suit filed by our client's former Middle East distributor. A federal San Francisco judge granted our summary judgment motion. The U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirmed the district court’s order, dismissing the case in our client’s favor.

Patent Holding Company v. Law Firm: A patent-holding company alleged our client, a prominent national law firm, misappropriated trade secrets. The company claimed our client violated various court protective orders and interfered with settlement obligations. In less than three months, we obtained a dismissal of all claims.

Plaintiff v. Chevron: We won a $5.5 million jury verdict against Chevron for wrongfully terminating and retaliating against a female petroleum engineer. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirmed the award.

Plaintiff v. Internet Search Engine: We represented a leading search engine in class action litigation concerning online advertising. Pursuant to our motion to dismiss, a federal judge dismissed the matter with prejudice.

Plaintiffs v. Consumer Finance Company: Our client, a major consumer finance company, faced a statewide class action alleging some of its financing disclosure statements were inadequate under California’s Rees-Levering Act. We secured a favorable settlement with the class representatives.

Broadcom Corporation, et al. v. Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation: We represent Broadcom and are leading a joint-defense group consisting of wireless chip manufacturers, PC manufacturers, and cellular network carriers against the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation, which asserts that its patent claims cover a wide variety of products that offer wireless functionality under the IEEE 802.11 standard for local area networks.

Toy Company v. Product Designer: We represented the designer of a very popular line of dolls in a federal trial to determine which toy company owns the doll's copyright. We settled the case on favorable terms before the commencement of trial.

Venture Capital Firm v. Music Publishing Group: We represented online file-sharing company investors against allegations of copyright infringement, and asserted counterclaims of antitrust violations. After we used crime fraud arguments to pierce the plaintiff's attorney-client privilege, the case settled on favorable terms.