Cyntec Company, Ltd. v. Chilisin Electronics Corp., et al.

Summary

The United States District Court for the Northern District of California grants Cyntec’s Daubert motion to exclude Dr. John C. Bravman from testifying on the ultimate question of obviousness and limits his use of secondary prior-art references. The court also finds that Dr. Kohl’s and Mr. Van Uden’s supplemental expert reports violated Rule 26 and were neither substantially justified nor harmless under Rule 37. The order therefore grants in part and denies in part Chilisin’s motion to strike the supplemental reports.

Holdings

1. Cyntec's motion to exclude Dr. Bravman's opinions was timely and procedurally proper because it was filed before the court-ordered deadline for pretrial objections, including Daubert motions.
2. Dr. Bravman may not testify on the ultimate question of obviousness because his report failed to address relevant objective indicia of nonobviousness, including commercial success, long-felt need, failure of others, unexpected results, and copying.
3. Dr. Bravman's primary invalidity references are limited to Shafer and Nakamura, but he may refer to other prior-art references to explain what was known in the art and why a skilled artisan would have been motivated to combine Shafer with Nakamura.
4. Dr. Kohl's supplemental report and Van Uden's third supplemental reports violated Rule 26, and the violations were neither substantially justified nor harmless; the reports were therefore excluded under Rule 37(c)(1).
5. The court denied Chilisin's motion to strike the supplemental reports under Rule 16 because it had already excluded the reports under Rule 37 and therefore did not need to decide the Rule 16 issue.

Questions Presented

1. Whether Cyntec's motion to exclude Dr. John C. Bravman's opinions was timely and procedurally proper.
2. Whether Dr. Bravman could testify on the ultimate issue of obviousness when his report did not address all relevant objective indicia of nonobviousness.
3. Whether Dr. Bravman could rely on primary invalidity references beyond Shafer and Nakamura, and whether he could refer to other references for background and motivation-to-combine purposes.
4. Whether Dr. Kohl's and Van Uden's supplemental expert reports violated Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 26 and, if so, whether the violations were substantially justified or harmless under Rule 37(c)(1).
5. Whether the supplemental reports should also be stricken under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 16.

Disposition

other