Today (July 22, 2013), the Federal Circuit Advisory Council
issued a Model Order that it hopes will assist trial courts in
crafting orders that reduce litigation costs and streamline patent
cases. The Model Order may be found here. Recognizing that litigants often wait
until the eve of trial to reduce the number of asserted patent
claims and prior art references, the Model Order offers deadlines
intended to enforce a more efficient case structure.
While mindful that discovery and the litigation must progress
before parties may effectively evaluate their positions, the Model
Order sets deadlines for an exchange of identification of asserted
claims and prior art references. One exchange is to occur after the
production of "core" technical documents, and the other
after the court issues a claim construction order. The first
exchange requires the plaintiff to identify preliminarily no more
than 10 claims per asserted patent, but no more than 32 asserted
claims. In
