Brad Caldwell

Practice Areas

Intellectual Property, Patent Infringement, Commercial Litigation, Co-founder Disputes

Career

Brad Caldwell is a trial lawyer who focuses on patent infringement and complex commercial litigation for both plaintiffs and defendants.

His courtroom success before judges, juries, and arbitration panels includes cases involving digital media, telecommunications and computer networking, data security, computer imaging, medical devices, enterprise software, banking technology, and oilfield services.

Mr. Caldwell has been named “Litigator of the Week” by The American Lawyer magazine two different times based on record-setting patent infringement verdicts against Apple Inc. Those jury awards of $625.6 million and $302 million were ranked as the 6th and 9th largest verdicts in the nation during 2016. The year prior, Mr. Caldwell helped Smartflash LLC win a $532.9 million verdict against Apple that was the year’s top Texas verdict and the largest intellectual property verdict in the U.S., ranking third nationwide overall.

Before starting his legal career, Mr. Caldwell worked for a year as an electrical engineer at the Central Intelligence Agency in Langley, Virginia, where he obtained a top-secret security clearance and was awarded multiple merit-based citations.

Professional Memberships

Dallas Committee on Foreign Relations

American Bar Foundation (Life Fellow)

Experience

Nanoco Technologies Ltd. v. Samsung Electronics Co.

Mr. Caldwell helped UK-based Nanoco Technologies Ltd. secure a $150 million settlement in a patent infringement lawsuit against technology giant Samsung Electronics Co. Nanoco, a company born from a university research group, is a leading innovator in nanoparticle and quantum dot technology. The company’s heavy metal-free quantum dots mitigate health risks presented by the use of toxic materials like cadmium in commercial products such as televisions and other displays. Nanoco filed suit in 2020 based on infringement of a series of patents covering the company’s quantum dot technology, which Samsung was accused of incorporating into its high-end “QLED” televisions. Samsung agreed to the settlement on the eve of jury selection for a long-awaited trial scheduled in the Marshall division of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas before the Hon. Chief District Judge Rodney Gilstrap.

SAS Institute Inc. v. World Programming Limited, et al.

Mr. Caldwell defended World Programming Limited, YUM! Brands, Inc., Luminex Software, Inc., Pizza Hut, Inc., and Shaw Industries Group, Inc., in a high-profile copyright and patent case filed by SAS Institute in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas. The lawsuit alleged that World Programming’s analytics software infringes intellectual property owned by SAS Institute. This was the latest in a decade-long string of lawsuits that SAS Institute has brought against its direct competitor, World Programming. In Fall 2020, the firm obtained a complete defense victory. On the eve of trial, the district court sided with World Programming and dismissed SAS Institute’s case with prejudice. Firm attorneys continue to represent World Programming in SAS Institute’s appeal to the Federal Circuit.

VirnetX Inc. v. Apple Inc.

Mr. Caldwell represents VirnetX in the company’s patent infringement litigation against technology giant Apple Inc. In a dispute that the Eastern District of Texas trial court said has attained Dickensian proportions, Caldwell Cassady & Curry has helped VirnetX win favorable verdicts in five separate trials where each jury awarded over $300 million in damages. In late 2012, we helped VirnetX win a $368 million verdict when a federal jury determined that Apple had infringed four VirnetX patents to produce the VPN On Demand and FaceTime features in the popular iPhone and other Apple products. After the case was sent back for a new trial on damages, we won again by securing a $625 million verdict for VirnetX in February 2016 after jurors in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas found that Apple continued to infringe VirnetX’s patents following the first trial to produce the FaceTime and re-designed VPN On Demand features. The jury also found that Apple’s infringement was willful regarding FaceTime and VPN on Demand. The court later vacated its order to consolidate the matters and set the cases for two separate jury trials focusing on different versions of Apple features. In the first new trial heard in September 2016 pertaining to the earlier generations of products, we helped VirnetX win a $302 million verdict against Apple before a new Eastern District jury. The verdict was entered as a $439.7 million judgment in September 2017 and affirmed on appeal by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. In the second new trial heard in April 2018 addressing the newer generations of products, a different Eastern District jury awarded a unanimous verdict of $502.6 million in favor of VirnetX after finding Apple’s infringement was willful. After that verdict was sent back for a new trial on damages, a final trial was held in Fall 2020, again in the Eastern District of Texas. In that trial, we secured a $502.8 million jury verdict following the Federal Circuit’s affirmance of the 2018 finding that Apple’s VPN On Demand in iOS versions 7.0 and later infringed VirnetX’s patents. The district court later denied Apple’s request for a new trial and entered the jury’s verdict in favor of VirnetX as a final judgment.

Match Group, LLC v. Bumble Trading, Inc.

Mr. Caldwell represented Match Group, LLC, owner of numerous online dating brands, including the iconic Tinder application, in a highly publicized intellectual property and business dispute with competitor Bumble Trading Inc. in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas.

Grace, et al. v. Apple Inc.

Mr. Caldwell was lead trial counsel of a class of plaintiffs in a high-profile consumer class action case in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California based on allegations that Apple Inc. intentionally broke the popular FaceTime video chat feature for millions of customers. The firm successfully defended the affected customers against Apple’s multiple attempts to dismiss the case and helped secure class certification for all California class plaintiffs in 2018. After the District Court denied Apple’s pre-trial Motion for Summary Judgment, the case settled on favorable terms.

Acantha LLC v. DePuy Synthes

Mr. Caldwell served as lead trial counsel for Acantha LLP in a patent infringement lawsuit against medical device manufacturer DePuy Synthes, a subsidiary of healthcare giant Johnson & Johnson. DePuy was sued based on its infringement of an Acantha patent that covers an orthopedic implant assembly used in surgical procedures. Following the August 2018 trial in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin, a jury of five women and three men delivered a unanimous $8.2 million verdict in favor of Mr. Caldwell’s client.

Dr. Robert Morley v. Square Inc.

Mr. Caldwell represented Washington University in St. Louis Professor Robert Morley in his suit against Square, Inc., Jack Dorsey, and Jim McKelvey for patent infringement and breach of fiduciary duty, misappropriation of trade secrets, exclusion of Dr. Morley from Square, and related business torts after Dr. Morley invented the famous Square credit card reader and helped create the company. The court case was pending in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri. Mr. Caldwell also represented Dr. Morley in related inter partes review (IPR) proceedings before the Patent Trial and Appeal Board.

Smartflash LLC matters against Apple, Samsung, HTC, Google, and Amazon

Mr. Caldwell served as lead trial lawyer for Smartflash in its patent infringement actions involving Smartflash’s data storage and access system patents, which were asserted against various devices and functionality involved in the operation of Apple’s iTunes Store and App Store, Google Play, and the Amazon Appstore. In February 2015, a jury found that Apple willfully infringed Smartflash’s patents with its iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch products, found that the patents were not invalid, and awarded Smartflash $532,900,000 in compensatory damages for Apple’s infringement.

Cellular Communications Equipment LLC v. Apple Inc.

Mr. Caldwell served as lead trial counsel on behalf of Cellular Communications Equipment LLC in a patent infringement lawsuit against Apple Inc. over a network technology patent. Following a trial in September 2016 in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, jurors awarded a $22 million verdict in favor of CCE. The award represented a running royalty on Apple’s infringement through March 2016.

VirnetX, Inc. v. Microsoft Corp.

Mr. Caldwell represented VirnetX as trial counsel in two patent infringement actions against Microsoft involving VirnetX’s network security patents. Mr. Caldwell and the others on the team inherited the first Microsoft case from another law firm after the close of discovery and with relatively little time to prepare for trial, but they were nevertheless successful in trial. The jury found Microsoft infringed willfully, found that the patents were valid, and awarded $105,750,000 to VirnetX. The case then settled while VirnetX’s request for a permanent injunction was pending. In a subsequent matter involving additional allegations of infringement by Microsoft, Microsoft settled with VirnetX before trial.

Education

Awards