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Technology Stocks : Qualcomm Incorporated (QCOM) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: mmeggs who wrote (13592)	8/12/1998 10:54:00 AM
From: JGoren	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 152472

Last I recall, the trial is supposed to be this fall in Marshall, Texas. Since I do not know who the judge is, I cannot guage how quickly the judge moves his or her docket. There has been absolutely nothing posted in the press about the lawsuit since that June, 1997 post. It's like it's dropped out of sight. So I have absolutely no idea how discovery and pretrial proceedings have been going. I am not about to go to Tyler or wherever the Clerk is to check the files--unless, of course, someone paid me for my time. There are often resettings, and federal judges are swamped with criminal cases, which I believe take priority. One test is who asks for a continuance. If it's Ericy, that might mean Ericy does not have its ducks in a row, may not feel too confident about the result. I would think, if Q has conducted its discovery and feels good about its case, it would push to get to trial to finish with the question. If Ericy loses, Ericy will have egg on its face and competitively in the market place be at further disadvantage. It will have shot its "best" guns and come out empty, but Qcom still has its potential suit against Ericy. On the other hand, a resetting may mean nothing other than the case isn't ready to try, it's not fully prepared from both sides, or the court's docket was so full it had to be postponed. From the press releases I posted, it appears that Q has not amended its answer in the Texas case to counterclaim for patent infringement. Although there is an agreement that Q can sue in San Diego for that, Q may decide (I doubt it) that it might as well litigate offensively in Texas as well as defensively. If it had amended its pleadings, I would think there would have been a press release. Probably, Q will let things ride because suing in San Diego is a better forum for a lot of reasons. It is extremely doubtful that the judge in East Texas is terribly familiar with high-tech patent matters and there is always that "fear" (justified or not) about the other guy's forum, the one in his backyard, so to speak. I would think that Q's lawyers would not want to spend anymore time in Marshall, Texas than necessary--if for no other reason, it's far from home and family, uncomfortable to be away from home and in a small town, inefficient, and expensive for the client.