Case Should not be Streamlined by "Assigning an Arbitrary Limit on the Number of Asserted Claims"

The court denied defendants' motion to limit the number of claims and patents asserted by plaintiff. "Initially, [plaintiff] asserted infringement of 361 claims from 16 patents. The parties reached an agreement whereby [plaintiff] reduced its asserted claims to 90 claims from 14 patents. At present, there are 56 claim terms in dispute. Defendants contend that this is an unmanageable number of claims and claim terms, and that the Court should limit the number of claims and claim terms that may be asserted by [plaintiff], that a day-long Markman hearing is necessary, and that additional pages of claim construction briefing should be permitted. The Court agrees that this case will need to be streamlined prior to trial, but assigning an arbitrary limit on the number of asserted claims or deciding which claims are duplicative is not the way to get there at this stage of the case. Instead, the parties should brief the claim terms that are the most likely to lead to a narrowing of the case once the terms are construed. The claim construction hearing will last no longer than three hours, and the ordinary page limits for briefing will apply."

Microunity Systems Engineering Inc v. Acer Inc et al, 2-10-cv-00091 (TXED June 7, 2012, Order) (Payne, M.J.).