Duplicative Deposition May Go Forward
Trading Techs. Int'l., Inc. v. eSpeed, Inc., No 04 C 5312, 2007 WL 1628352 (N.D. Ill. Mar. 1, 2007) (Moran, Sen. J.).
Judge Moran denied plaintiff Trading Technologies' ("TT") motion for a protective order to prevent the deposition of Robert Klinger, related to defendant eSpeed's inequitable conduct defense (more on this case in the Blog's archives). The Court held that discovery is a "balancing act." eSpeed's assertion that Klinger was involved in drafting a response to a USPTO Office Action at the center of its inequitable conduct claim outweighed TT's best argument -- that the deposition was duplicative because defendants had deposed or have scheduled the depositions of two lead outside patent prosecutors, TT's in-house patent prosecutor and the relevant patent examiner. The Court also noted that the case is approaching the discovery close, so we may start seeing fewer discovery motions in the case and more substantive motions.
