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Amy Van Zant

Partner

Silicon Valley

Clients count on Amy to move their business forward. Whether litigating a complex patent suit, or advising on a multi-faceted IP strategy, Amy incorporates an in-depth understanding of each client’s business, employees and corporate strategy into her solutions.

For her litigation practice, Amy’s ability to distill the most complicated technology across an array of fields, including telecommunications, semiconductor manufacturing, renewable energy, cloud computing, and big data, into relatable, every day concepts that has made her successful in persuading judges and juries alike. She has led trial teams, litigated, and tried cases in state court in California, numerous District Courts, the International Trade Commission, and has briefed appeals before the 9th Circuit, the Federal Circuit, the Supreme Court of California, and the United States Supreme Court. 

Whether litigating patent, trade secret, or IP contract disputes, Amy strives to put herself in her client’s shoes to ensure personalized results tailored to each client’s business objectives. As SAP’s General Counsel Landon Edmond commented to Acritas, Amy “has acquired a great knowledge of our business, and therefore you know you can trust her in a wide variety of topics and to get the right colleagues within her firm involved across the globe.”

Amy also provides comprehensive IP counseling on issues including trade secrets protection, employee departure investigations, freedom to operate analysis, licensing strategies, data privacy protection, and regulatory compliance. She has also conducted comprehensive patent portfolio reviews and assisted with IP corporate transactions.

In addition to her IP work, Amy devotes significant time to her pro bono work. For more than a decade, she has assisted domestic violence victims, as well as led Orrick’s Bay Area summer program that enables law clerks to be certified to argue in Family Court to obtain Temporary Restraining Orders for domestic violence clients.

    • Femto-Sec Tech, Inc. v. Alcon Labs, Inc., et al. (C.D. Cal.): Represented Lawrence Livermore National Security in seven cases involving patent infringement, breach of contract, and fraud claims regarding femtosecond laser technology for ophthalmic surgery procedures. Defeated early Alice motion and prevailed on motion to dismiss against licensee.
    • MicroUnity Systems Engineering, Inc. v. Acer et al. (EDTX): Led damages team for Texas Instruments in sprawling, multi-defendant patent litigation involving fifteen patents that were asserted against chip manufacturers and handset makers.
    • Ariba, Inc. v. Coupa Software, Inc. et al. (Superior Court of the State of California, Santa Clara County): Represented Ariba in trade secret case involving allegations that former Ariba employees misappropriated Ariba trade secret information.
    • Coho Licensing Inc. v. Rovi, Inc. et al. (N.D. Cal.): Represented Rovi in patent litigation suit brought by licensing entity against multiple defendants. Filed successful motion to stay pending IPR, which resulted in the case being dismissed.
    • Ariba, Inc. v. Coupa Software, Inc. (N.D. Cal.): Represented Ariba in patent litigation against competitor regarding software patent. Defeated motion to dismiss and motion for summary judgment.
    • Ariba v. Emptoris (E.D. Texas): Representation of Ariba in a patent infringement action regarding on-line auction technology. Won summary judgment on one patent prior to trial. The jury returned a verdict of infringement on the other patent, found both patents valid and found one patent willfully infringed.
    • Qualcomm Incorporated v. Broadcom, Inc. (S.D. Cal.): Represented Qualcomm in a trade secret dispute.
    • GlobespanVirata v. Texas Instruments, Inc. (D. NJ): Obtained a jury verdict of $112 million for Texas Instruments and Stanford University for infringement of patents involving high speed DSL modem technology.
    • Zoltar Satellite Alarm Systems, Inc. v. Snaptrack, Inc. and QUALCOMM CORP. (S.D. Cal.): Represented SnapTrack and QUALCOMM in this patent infringement action. In 2004, a jury found the clients not liable for infringement of six of the seven claims at issue, and the court granted defendants’ judgment as a matter of law of non-infringement as to the final claim. Successfully defeated appeal to the Federal Circuit.
    • Atmel Corporation v. Agere Systems, Inc., C-03-04632 JCS (N.D. Cal.): Represented Atmel in a patent infringement case involving digital signal processing chips.
    • Pavilion Technologies, Inc. v. Computer Associates International, Inc. (W.D. Tex.): Represented Computer Associates International, Inc. in a patent case involving artificial intelligence technology.
    • In the Matter of Certain Programmable Logic Devices and Products Containing Same (ITC): Represented Altera in this investigation involving patents concerning programmable logic devices.
    • Altera v. Xilinx, C-00-20593-JF (N.D. Cal.): Defended Altera on Xilinx’s counterclaim alleging infringement of three patents concerning programmable logic elements, memory blocks, and routing used in field programmable gate array technology.
    • ECI Telecom Ltd. v. Amati Communications Corporation (Superior Court, County of Santa Clara): Represented Amati, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Texas Instruments, in this lawsuit involving ownership of patents, breach of development agreement, and software trade secret misappropriation relating to digital subscriber line (DSL) technology.
    • Kraus v. Trinity Management Service, Inc. and Cortez v. Purolator Air Filtration Products Co.: Represented amicus State Farm Insurance in connection with this seminal case interpreting California’s Section 17200 Unfair Competition Law.
    • Infuturia Global Ltd. v. Sequus Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (Superior Court for the County of San Mateo): Represented Sequus in a breach of contract action regarding a license agreement relating to the development of a cancer treatment.

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