John P. Schnurer Partner

John Schnurer litigates and tries cases in courts throughout the country, including more than 15 Section 337 investigations before the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC). He has handled nine jury trials and nineteen bench trials, six of which were patent trials at the ITC, as well as numerous district court and state court cases.

John is also recognized as a leading intellectual property strategist, particularly with respect to the development and execution of global patent litigation strategies. He also provides strategic intellectual property counseling regarding patent infringement, validity, post-grant proceedings, and large portfolio due diligence studies, whether for acquisitions, licensing, or pre-suit purposes. He achieves optimum results by partnering with his clients to devise and execute customized legal strategies that are consistent with his clients' tactical and strategic business objectives. His background as a former electrical engineer complements his legal practice.

John also has significant experience in patent post-grant proceedings before the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), including post-grant review (PGR), covered business method (CBM) patent review, inter partes review (IPR), patent reexamination, supplemental examination, and reissue proceedings. He has been involved in over 30 IPR/CBM petitions and proceedings (whether petitioner or patent owner) and has argued several of those before the USPTO Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB).

John has represented and currently represents Chinese, Korean, Japanese, and Taiwanese companies in litigation, particularly patent and trade secret misappropriation cases, such as TCL, HTC, Goodix, ASUS, SK hynix, and Largan Precision, as well as U.S. companies such as Verizon and Monolithic Power Systems. He was lead counsel for ASUS in three cases against IBM, one of which IBM brought before the ITC (337-TA-628)—a patent case concerning products implementing power supplies, thermal management, and network address port translation. His efforts resulted in a win at trial with the initial determination finding no infringement. The ITC decided not to review the initial determination, which became final. Additionally, he was lead counsel for HTC in three cases against FlashPoint Technology, Inc., a spin-off of Apple’s Image Capture Division, two of which FlashPoint brought before the ITC (337-TA-850 and 337-TA-726). The 726 investigation concerned various camera functionalities in HTC smartphones. His efforts resulted in a win at trial, with the initial determination finding no infringement, no domestic industry, and one of the patents invalid due to on-sale commercial activities. Significantly, other respondents including Nokia and RIM settled shortly before trial, and LG settled after trial but prior to the initial determination, each paying substantial licensing fees. The ITC affirmed the initial determination and also found that HTC had an implied license to practice the asserted patents for its Windows-based products. FlashPoint appealed the ITC’s determination to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, which affirmed the ITC’s decision in favor of HTC less than a week after oral arguments.

John previously served as an attorney with the U.S. Air Force and as a special assistant U.S. attorney with the Department of Justice (DOJ) representing the United States on a wide range of matters, including criminal, government contracts, procurement, environmental, real estate, healthcare, medical malpractice, taxation, and international. John also supervised criminal trial attorneys and first-chaired numerous felony jury and bench trials and civil lawsuits involving environmental, medical malpractice, and other tort causes of action.

*D.C. practice limited to representation of the public before U.S. Departments and Agencies pursuant to D.C. Court of Appeals Rules 49(c)(2).