Robert Fram joined the firm in 1992 and focuses his practice on intellectual property litigation. 

Experience

Robert Fram has substantial experience litigating patent, trade secret and licensing cases, representing clients including Apple, CA, SAP, Fujitsu,  Symantec, Palm and Yahoo!.

Representative Engagements

Intellectual Property Litigation

• PhatRat Technology v. Apple, Inc.. The firm represented Apple in a patent infringement case relating to sensor technology.
• Overture Services, Inc. v. Google Inc., Northern District of California, Case No. 02-01991 JSW (EDL). The firm represented Yahoo! subsidiary, Overture Services, in a lawsuit alleging infringement of Overture's pioneering paid search patent. In a highly-publicized settlement, Google took a license to this patent and several related patents.
• GlobespanVerata v. Texas Instruments, Inc. The firm obtained a jury verdict of $112 million for Texas Instruments and Stanford University for infringement of patents involving high speed DSL modem technology.
• Disc Link v. Oracle et al., Eastern District of Texas. The firm represents a group of defendants, including SAP, CA, Kodak, Altera, Novell and Sonic Solutions, in patent litigation regarding hyperlink technology.
• Ariba v. Emptoris.  The firm represents Ariba in this case in the Eastern District of Texas regarding on-line auction technology.
• NTP v. Palm. The firm represents Palm against NTP regarding the so-called “Blackberry patents;” successfully obtained a stay pending reexamination.
• Overture Services, Inc. v. FindWhat.com, Inc., C.D. Cal., Case No. SACV 03-00685 CJC (Ex). The firm represented Overture in a patent infringement lawsuit brought against FindWhat.com relating to Overture's paid search technology.
• AMC Technology v. SAP AG, Inc. The firm represents SAP AG in a trade secret and copyright dispute regarding Customer Relationship Management software.
• Computer Associates v. Simple.com, et al. The firm represents Computer Associates before the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York in this patent infringement case relating to Internet portal technology, in which Computer Associates was seeking declaratory judgment of invalidity, unenforceability, and non-infringement. Heller Ehrman secured a Report & Recommendation of non-infringement from the Special Master.
• Chan v. Intuit, Inc., U.S. District Court, Northern District of California, No. C 02-2878-VRW. The firm represented Symantec Corporation in a lawsuit alleging that their "Live Update" and web-based help software infringe a patent related to the distribution of information by a combination of CD-ROMs and the public Internet.
• Pavilion Technologies, Inc. v. Computer Associates International, Inc., U.S. District Court, Western District of Texas, No. A-01CA-507-SS. The firm represented Computer Associates International, Inc. in a patent case involving artificial intelligence technology.
• MCI, et al. v. AT&T Corp., 97-CV-4453, Eastern District of Pennsylvania. The firm represented MCI in this patent infringement case involving computer telephony services.
• Linear Technology Corporation v. Unitrode Corporation, C98-1727 VRW, Northern District of California. The firm represented Unitrode Corporation, an affiliate of Texas Instruments, in this patent infringement case involving “sleep mode” and current reversal protection aspects of voltage regulators.
• Altiris, Inc. v. Symantec Corporation, 2:99 CV-1007ST, Central District of Utah. The firm represents Symantec Corporation in this patent infringement case involving technology for remotely controlling the boot process of a computer.
• RSA Data Security, Inc. v. Cylink Corporation, C96-20094 SW, Northern District of California. The firm represented RSA Data Security, Inc. in litigation involving patent and license rights to public key and related encryption software, technology that has become central to electronic commerce over the Internet.
• Computer Sciences Corporation v. Computer Associates International, Inc. CV981440 and 981374 WMB (SHx), Central District of California. The firm represented Computer Associates in an action in which Computer Sciences Corporation alleged that Computer Associates misappropriated confidential financial information in connection with a $10 billion takeover attempt.
• Informix Software, Inc. v. Oracle Corporation, 9701-00568, Multnomah County Circuit Court (Oregon). The firm represented Informix Software, Inc. in this trade secret litigation regarding database server and middleware software.
• Computer Associates v. Software A.G., C97-0071D, Western District of Washington. The firm represented Computer Associates in this software license dispute with Software A.G. regarding the right to receive upgrades of the ADABAS database product.
• Atmel Corporation v. SST, C96-00039 SC, Northern District of California. The firm represented Atmel Corporation in this patent infringement action. The patents relate to circuits and memory cell designs for flash memory and EEPROMs.

Privacy Rights

• Hepting, et al. v. AT&T.  The firm represents plaintiffs in this landmark case concerning alleged mass electronic surveillance of Internet and telephone communications by the NSA. Over the objections of the Department of Justice, Mr. Fram successfully persuaded the District Court that the case should not be dismissed on the basis of the State Secret privilege. 

State and Federal Court Commercial Litigation

• Fujitsu Ltd. v. Cirrus Logic, Inc. and related actions, C02-CV-01627 JW, Santa Clara Superior Court. The firm represented Fujitsu Ltd. in a large multi-party contract dispute concerning defective semiconductor chips sold to Fujitsu.
• Oakland Raiders v. National Football League, CV 756194, Superior Court, County of Santa Clara. Mr. Fram represented the National Football League (NFL) in this breach of contract and business tort brought by the Raiders.