Eric Rutt

Overview

Eric is an experienced litigator focusing his practice on patent and trade secret litigation. His practice covers all aspects of litigation, including pre-suit investigation, fact and expert discovery, trial, and appeal. He also represents clients in inter partes review (IPR) proceedings. 

During law school, Eric served as a legal intern for a Boston immigration law firm, where he assisted asylum applicants. Since joining Wolf Greenfield, Eric has assisted pro bono clients to obtain asylum based on the risk of political persecution in their country of origin. Before attending law school, Eric worked for several years as a laboratory technician for Merck.

Experience

District Court Litigation

• Represented a cancer diagnostics company in a patent litigation in Delaware against a competitor. Played a key role in architecting the litigation strategy and litigating the case through trial to secure a jury verdict in 2021 finding both asserted patents infringed and not invalid. 
• Defended Kantar Media Audiences and WPP against claims for patent infringement, trade secret misappropriation, and breach of fiduciary duty. Secured dismissal of TRA’s patent infringement and trade secret claims at summary judgment. On remand from appeal, succeeded in eliminating TRA’s $200 million compensatory damages claim and achieving stipulated judgment of non-infringement, followed by attorney-fee award. 
• Assisted in winning multi-million dollar jury verdict on breach of contract counterclaim after successfully invalidating plaintiff’s patent.
• Lead associate in patent false marking case. Obtained stay after challenging constitutionality of patent false marking statute, and settled on favorable terms shortly thereafter.
• Lead associate in trademark infringement case. Obtained injunction against defendant to prevent counterfeit use of client’s trademarks.
• Successfully represented clients in domain name disputes, obtaining transfer of domain name when representing plaintiff and preventing transfer of domain name when representing defendant.

Post-Grant Proceedings

• On behalf of patent owner WisTa Laboratories, secured Final Written Decision upholding all challenged claims of two patents directed to a purified pharmaceutical compound (IPR2018-00182 and IPR2018-00323).
• Assisted with securing denial of institution of IPRs challenging two patents directed to botulinum toxin formulations (IPR2021-01203 and IPR2021-01204). 
• Assisted with securing denial of institution of IPR challenging a patent directed to a pharmaceutical compound (IPR2017-02004).

Recognition

Eric has been named repeatedly to the list of Massachusetts Rising Stars by Super Lawyers.