Federal Circuit Reverses Punitive Exceptional Case Fee Award As Improperly Enhanced

On January 22, 2016, the Federal Circuit issued its opinion in Lumen View Technology LLC v. FindTheBest.com (Dkt. No. 15-1275), in which it vacated and remanded the lower court’s award of enhanced attorney fees under 35 U.S.C. § 285. Although the Federal Circuit affirmed the district court’s finding that case was exceptional under § 285, it also held that the lower court failed to give adequate support for its enhancement of the lodestar fee amount and remanded for recalculation of the award.  

By way of background, the complaint filed in the Southern District of New York alleged infringement of one patent that claimed a method of facilitating bilateral and multilateral decision-making. The defendant operates a specialized search website with a comparison feature that does not use a bilateral or multilateral preference matching process, but instead uses preference data from only one party. In its opposition to the defendant’s motion for judgment on the