In a letter sent today to House Committee on the Judiciary, Retail Industry Leaders Association (RILA) Senior Vice President of Government Affairs Bill Hughes stressed the importance of stopping the frivolous and costly lawsuits brought by non-practicing entities, patent trolls, on the retail industry. Retailers have worked to employ innovative technologies to benefit their customers, and unfortunately, these improvements have made them targets for lawsuits from patent trolls that have diverted costs from investments in our communities.


The retail industry is a crucial driver of our nations economy, and as our customers embrace and utilize technology they expect retailers to do the same, Bill Hughes stated in the letter. However, abusive lawsuits brought by patent trolls have drained valuable time and resources from our companies.


RILA urges the committee to address this senseless litigation in order to allow retailers to use innovative technologies to bring exciting new products to the consumer without the fear of abusive and costly patent troll lawsuits.


We encourage the committee to explore solutions that will curtail these abuses of our legal system, while still protecting rights of patent owners, said Hughes.


In 2007, 22% of patent cases were filed by patent trolls. That number has exploded to 60% in 2012, and about 90% cases are without a judgment on the merits, meaning that companies often settle even though no actual infringement might have occurred. A recent study reported the median cost of litigating a patent case through trial is between $650,000 and $5 million and the discovery phase costs $350,000 to $3 million. However, patent trolls, unlike the defendant retailer, often have little to no discovery cost because it simply purchased the patent and is not the inventor.


The House Judiciary Subcommittee on Courts, Intellectual Property and the Internet will hold a hearing later today on abusive patent litigation. Among those testifying will be RILA member company executive Janet Dhillon, Executive Vice President, General Counsel and Secretary, J.C. Penney Company, Inc.


Full text of the letter to the House Committee on the Judiciary is below and a link to the PDF is here.