Successful Project Management and Expertise in a Variety of Litigation
Intellectual Property and Patent Litigation
Our area of specialty in intellectual property is patent litigation. Find out how you can leverage our experience for your review project.
Class Action Lawsuits
Class actions sparked from mortgage defaults, mass foreclosures and more will continue to rise. Learn how our expertise in this area helps you during the review process.
Corporate Litigation
Our leadership team comes together to offer a diverse background in this area of litigation. Put our experience to work for you during your next document review.
Mergers and Acquisitions
We thoroughly understand the second request process and what is required to succeed in this type of scenario. Take advantage of our knowledge of federal regulatory compliance.
International Trade Commission and IP Litigation
With more than a decade of “bet the business” litigation experience, the team at Essential Discovery has a wide breadth of knowledge in intellectual property matters, especially those that are patent related.
Clients often find themselves litigating in a “rocket docket” district court or increasingly, before the International Trade Commission (ITC). Although the ITC cannot grant monetary damages, it may block the entrance of any product into the United States that is deemed to infringe the asserted patents. As an administrative court, it’s not bound to follow the stringent Federal Rules of Evidence and cases must complete trial in less than two years.
In July 2008, the ITC publicized amendments to several of its rules. These changes relate to the pre-filing investigation—the materials necessary for the filing the complaint. As a result of the changes, cases may take more time to be completed but the trial phase may be scheduled earlier so administrative law judges have time to review the evidence and make a ruling.
Since parties will probably find themselves having even less time during the main discovery phase to collect, review and produce the relevant evidence, the importance of collaborating with a partner like Essential Discovery is crucial.
The team at Essential Discovery has helped numerous clients during the deadline-driven process of presenting evidence in these types of cases. Our document reviewers take on enormous quantities of documents in very tight time frames, and our project management team runs reviews around the clock, in ergonomic and secure high-bandwidth war rooms across the country and in some international markets.
Mortgage Defaults, Mass Foreclosures and Class Actions
The current subprime meltdown has sparked document-intensive consumer class actions in the banking sector and other complex commercial litigation. The changes that Congress and other legislative bodies continue to make in attempt to stop the trend of mortgage defaults and foreclosures will likely create enough ambiguity in the system to keep courts busy for years to come.
These types of cases involve a variety of parties and can cause a surplus of discovery issues, mainly because recordkeeping styles of corporations differ from small businesses and individual consumers. Still, courts involved will not accept any excuses for a lack of adherence to the rules of presenting evidence. In cases like these, having a partner with long-term eDiscovery and document review experience is vital.
Essential Discovery builds review teams for law firms handling consumer class actions that require attorneys with technical backgrounds to review electronic and hard copy documents for presenting evidence. Our far-reaching network allows us to construct teams in nearly every market, and set up secure project workspaces so clients can successfully meet deadlines and objectives.
Corporate Litigation
With more than 50 years of combined legal industry experience, the team at Essential Discovery is comprised of expert, creative problem solvers who have successfully handled complex commercial litigation and class action lawsuits in a variety of legal venues. Our clients benefit from our hands-on experience in specialized practice areas, including federal regulatory compliance, IP and patent litigation and more.
Mergers and Acquisition Litigation
Essential Discovery’s team has demonstrated success in handling federal regulatory compliance cases. Many corporate legal departments and law firms face difficulties under the Hart-Scott-Rodino Antitrust Improvements Act (HSR Act) premerger requirements, when federal agencies such as the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) seek to review the mergers and acquisition activity through the “second request” process.
Second request investigations are typically conducted in an extremely fast time frame (collection and production within 30 to 45 days) and still must yield very accurate evidence. Recent amendments to merger review processes eased some of the burdens once experienced during a DOJ/FTC merger investigation, but sizeable difficulties still exist.
Now that there may be a limit to the number of custodians from whom information is collected, it’s essential that the “right” custodians be chosen on the first pass. The same is true of backup tapes. Essential Discovery assists in making sure the collection is handled quickly and accurately.
Despite the process differences between the DOJ and FTC, significant improvements have been made by both agencies with respect to creating a privilege log. Allowing for the creation of a partial privilege log introduces time and cost-saving possibilities.
Understanding these issues and maintaining relationships with preferred e-discovery software vendors enables Essential Discovery to respond efficiently and accurately in the allotted time frame. Our team is experienced in handling second requests and is available any time to assist in every phase of the process.
Our team’s combined experience offers a variety of benefits when working with us on your electronic discovery and document review project. Request a quote today.