Judge quotes Robert Frost in denying Apple’s request for a trial delay

Eastern District of Texas Judge Rodney Gilstrap denied Apple’s request to postpone an in-person jury trial in a patent lawsuit over 4G LTE technology, quoting poet Robert Frost in his reasoning why the trial should begin in two weeks despite the pandemic, reports Law360.

In a 9-page order, the judge rejected Apple’s bid earlier this month to delay an Aug. 3 trial for two months amid the recent surge in COVID-19 cases in Texas. Apple had argued that holding the trial as scheduled would endanger “all involved in the trial,” as well as local areas and the areas all participants would be going back to after the trial. The judge disagreed.

“The task of balancing very real public health concerns against the right of the parties to resolve their far-reaching disputes is a challenge this court has not sought and does not relish,” Gilstrap wrote. “However, as Robert Frost admonished in A Servant to Servants, ‘the best way out is always through.’”

In February 2019, a group of firms operating under the name Optis Wireless Technology sued Apple over seven patents connected to LTE cellular standards. Every LTE Apple device is affected, including not just iPhones but iPads and the Apple Watch, according to court documents. The plaintiffs — who seem to be “patent trolls” — say that, as recently as January 2017, they were talking to Apple about licensing patents on FRAND (fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory) terms, but came to no agreement. 

By the way, a patent troll is an individual or an organization that purchases and holds patents for unscrupulous purposes such as stifling competition or launching patent infringement suits. In legal terms, a patent troll is a type of non-practicing entity: someone who holds a patent but is not involved in the design or manufacture of any product or process associated with that patent.