Last year into this one, RPX followed the collection of US patents by Velocity Communication Technologies, LLC
(VCT), most of those patents received from NXP
Semiconductors. VCT has now launched litigation, suing
Acer (5:25-cv-00099), ASUSTek (5:25-cv-00100), Cisco (5:25-cv-00101), D-Link (5:25-cv-00103), Dell (1:25-cv-00850), HP (5:25-cv-00104), HP Enterprise
(HPE) (Aruba Networks) (5:25-cv-00105), Juniper
Networks (recently acquired by HPE) (5:25-cv-00106), Lenovo
(Motorola Mobile Communication Technology) (5:25-cv-00107), LG
Electronics (LGE) (5:25-cv-00108), OnePlus (5:25-cv-00098), and TP-Link
(an apparent subsidiary of JH-1 Zhao) (5:25-cv-00109): Dell, in Delaware; the rest,
in the Eastern District of Texas. Targeted with 11 patents is the
provision of devices that support the IEEE 802.11ax (Wi-Fi 6)
standard, including access points, computers, laptops,
motherboards, routers, smartphones, TVs, workstations, and
more.
The same 11 wireless communications patents (8,213,870; 8,238,832; 8,238,859; 8,260,213; 8,265,573; 8,270,343; 8,644,765; 8,675,570; 9,083,401; 9,596,648; 10,200,096) are asserted against each
defendant. All but the ‘570 patent came to VCT via NXP, which
divested roughly 50 US patents to the plaintiff in March 2024. In
January 2025, NCH 93, LLC, an entity formed in Delaware in
September 2019, assigned the ‘570 patent to VCT as well.
ZTE had transferred that patent to NCH 93 back in
December 2019.
Formed in Delaware on March 15, 2024, VCT pleads that it
“holds a pool of over 220 patent assets across 46 distinct
patent families developed by leading pioneers from across the globe
in the field of wireless communications, including Marvell
Technology, Inc.; NXP Semiconductors N.V.;
Freescale Semiconductor, Inc.; BlackBerry
Ltd.; and ZTE Corporation”. NXP acquired Freescale in
late 2015. Transfers in 2019 (from Marvell) and 2020 (from
BlackBerry) moved hundreds more patents to NXP. Some of the assets
from BlackBerry, Freescale, and Marvell are among the 11 patents
now in suit. Currently available USPTO records number VCT’s
patent well below the 220 pleaded, suggesting there may be
additional transfers not yet recorded (or not yet made public).
VCT is linked to OptiMorphix, Inc., a litigating plaintiff the
“authorized officer” of which is Brooks Borchers.
Borchers is associated with multiple other litigation campaigns,
including that of DIFF Scale Operation Research, LLC, which
pleaded that its president and owner Borchers is “a former
leader of research and development divisions at Boston Scientific
Corporation”; Dynamic Data Technologies, LLC, a Delaware
entity that provided as its address that of a residential home
owned by Brooks and Rachel Borchers; Castlemorton Wireless, LLC, which litigated
patents that it received in an assignment signed by Borchers, as
the recipient’s president; and, more recently, NexGen Control Systems LLC.
According to the new complaints, the defendants’ alleged
infringement has been willful, VCT pointing to four instances where
the defendants purportedly gained knowledge of the patents: (1) in
September 2020, when NXP submitted a Letter of Assurance (LOA) for
essential patent claims to the Institute of Electrical and
Electronics Engineers (IEEE) indicating that “NXP owns patents
that may be essential to the implementation of 802.11ax”; (2)
in March 2024, when ZTE submitted a LOA to the IEEE indicating that
it owned 802.11ax essential patents; (3) in April 2025, when
counsel for the plaintiff sent several of the defendants a letter
explaining that its patent portfolio covers “technologies
‘incorporated into the IEEE 802.11ax (i.e., Wi-Fi 6)
standard, including: Uplink Multi-User Multiple-Input
Multiple-Output (UL MU-MIMO); Basic Service Set (BSS) Coloring;
Target Wake Time (TWT); Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple
Access (OFDMA); Longer OFDM Symbol Duration; Beamforming; and
Transmit Power Control (TPC)'” and that its patents
“also cover[] technologies included in the mandatory sections
of the Wi-Fi 6E extension of the 802.11ax standard”; and (4)
at minimum, as of the date of the filing of the complaint.
Through two transactions dated on July 31, 2024, NXP assigned a
portfolio of chip packaging patents to Chip Packaging Technologies, LLC, which was
formed in Texas on July 2, 2024 and began litigating its received
assets this past February; for coverage, see “Litigation over Former OpCo Chip Portfolio
Proliferates, with More Likely Coming” (February 2025). In
recent years, NXP patents have been transferred to other NPEs,
including, for example, to Dublin-based monetization firm
Atlantic IP Services Limited‘s Eireog Innovations Limited and to Total Semiconductor, LLC. Most prominently,
Fortress’s VLSI Technology LLC has been litigating a
large portfolio of such assets through cases filed in multiple
venues against Intel. The parties there await
Western District of Texas Alan D. Albright’s judgment following
a jury verdict in Intel’s favor on an issue key to a license
defense. For details, see “Jury Finds Fortress Controlled VLSI and Finjan,
Teeing Up Ruling on License Defense” (June 2025).
ZTE has also divested patent portfolios. Most recently (in
January 2025), it assigned a batch of patents to DRNC Holdings, Inc., an InterDigital, Inc. subsidiary. DRNC has not
filed suit over its received assets. Back in January 2023, ZTE
transferred a batch of patents to Atlantic IP’s Iarnach Technologies Limited, which has sued
AT&T, Charter Communications, and Verizon in a
campaign that remains open against Charter, albeit stayed. The
“infringement read” there is largely based on
Charter’s alleged implementation of the
CableLabs DPoE v2.0 standard; CableLabs and ZTE
entered into a license agreement; discovery has been propounded to
determine whether ZTE exercised an “opt out” in that
agreement; and the court has granted a joint motion to stay while the parties
“get to the bottom of this issue”, particularly whether a
license defense will end the case.
In early December 2022, ZTE assigned several US patents to Harfang IP Investment Corp’s Hedwig Wireless Technologies LLC, moving
roughly 50 patents on December 31, 2022 to Advanced Standard Communication LLC, an entity
formed in Delaware on December 19, 2022 and providing a generic
Garland, Texas address. These transfers follow multiple other 2022
divestitures by ZTE, including at least one to NPEs associated with
IP Edge LLC; see here for more details, including about
litigation spawned by that transaction.
USPTO records also reflect two 2022 assignments from ZTE to Eight Deer Ventures LLC, an entity tied by
public records to Markman Advisors and Kroub,
Silbersher, & Kolmykov PLLC—both associated with 2BCom LLC, an NPE that has been litigating
patents received from Toshiba since 2019.
Additional assignments to Eight Deer appear in more recent records,
one dated in April 2023 and another in June 2023. Eight Deer has
not filed litigation over its received assets, nor has Hedwig
Wireless (which picked up additional ZTE resources in April 2023).
Last October, Advanced Standard Communication (which also received
more assets from ZTE, in March, April, and July 2023), filed suit
against Xiaomi but not in the US.
The litigation of former ZTE patents generating the most
headlines over the last couple of years, though, was filed by NPE
G+ Communications LLC, over a portfolio
divested in 2020. A first jury verdict for G+ was set aside in
favor of a damages retrial, which produced a second verdict, with
an award for G+ of $142M. However, problems with that result
continued; for details, see “IPR and EPR Rulings Imperil Recent East Texas
Verdicts in Favor of G+ Communications” (May 2024).
As has been typical for Borchers-linked entities, Berger &
Hipskind LLP provides representation, as does Capshaw Derieux LLP
in Texas, where District Judge Robert W. Schroeder III has been
assigned to preside, and Bayard PA in Delaware, where a just has
yet to be assigned. 7/9, Dell, District of Delaware, Acer, ASUSTek,
Cisco, D-Link, HP, HPE (Aruba Networks, Juniper Networks), Lenovo
(Motorola Mobile Communication Technology), LGE, OnePlus, TP-Link,
Eastern District of Texas.
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