Pulse Electronics, Inc. v. U.D. Electronic Corp. ( 2020 )

gre ae □ FILED 1 Lc □ | JAN 1 §-2020 | soul Sraict Se oaeORN 4 6 UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 7 . SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA 8 . 9 || PULSE ELECTRONICS, INC., a Case No.: 3:18-cv-00373-BEN-MSB 10 Delaware corporation, . Plaintife | ORDER GRANTING MOTION FOR 1] "| LEAVE TO FILE FIRST AMENDED 42 . COMPLAINT □ 3 U.D. ELECTRONIC CORP., a Taiwan [Doc. No. 5 4,] corporation, 14 Defendant. 15 : . 16 17 18 Before the Court is Plaintiff Pulse Electronics, Inc.’s (“Plaintiff”) Motion for 19 |i Leave of Court to File First Amended Complaint. Having reviewed the Motion and 20 || related filings, the Court determines that the Motion is suitable for decision without □□□□ 2] argument. For the reasons discussed below, Plaintiff's Motion is GRANTED. _ 22 BACKGROUND 23 Plaintiff is a worldwide design and manufacturer of RJ-45 Integrated Connector 24 || Modules (“ICM”).! (Doc. Number ¢ 19.) Defendant U.D. Electronic Corp. 25 |] . □ 26 : 27 Plaintiff is a corporation organized and existing under the laws of the state of 38 Pennsylvania and maintains its principal place of business at 15255 Innovation Drive, Suite #100, San Diego, California, 92128. (Doc. No.1 91.) _ ] (“Defendant”) is a manufacturer and supplier of data communications equipment, 2 |lincluding RJ-45 ICMs.2 /d. 7 13. 3 Plaintiff originally filed the Complaint against the Defendant on February 16, 4 112018. (Doc. No. 1.) In the Complaint, Plaintiff asserted four (4) counts of patent 5 infringement against Defendant.? See Id. Specifically, Plaintiff alleges that “various 6 ICM products infringe four (4) Pulse patents, including claims 1, and 3 through 16 7 U.S, Patent 6,773,302 (“the “‘302 Patent”); claims 1,16, 18, 33, 38, 39 and 41 of U.S. || Patent 7,959,473 the “*473 Patent”); claims 14 and 17 of U.S. Patent 9,178,318 (the 9 “*318 Patent”); and claims 1, 7, 10, 11, 12, and 16 of U.S. Patent 6,593,840 (the “840 10 Patent”). (Doc. No. 54 at 1.) . 11 || After the parties participated in an ENE and CMC, the Court issued a Scheduling _ 12 || Order setting the Markman hearing for April 18, 2019. Jd. The Markman hearing was 13 || subsequently vacated after the Court granted Defendant’s Motion to Stay the Proceedings 14 || pending IPR review. Id. The Court lifted the stay on November 18, 2019. fd. Plaintiff 15 || now seeks to add additional patent infringement claims of indirect infringement against 16 ||Defendant under 35 U.S.C. § 271. Id. To date, no response to Plaintiff’s Motion has 17 |! been filed by the Defendant. . 18 DISCUSSION 19 Leave to amend under Rule 15(a)(2) should be “freely give[n] ... when justice so 20 ||requires.” The Ninth Circuit “has noted on several occasions . . . that the Supreme Court 21 ||has instructed the lower federal courts to heed carefully the command of Rule 15(a), ... 22 || by freely granting leave to amend when justice so requires.” DCD Programs, Ltd. v. 23 || Leighton, 833 F.2d 183, 186 (9th Cir, 1987) (noting “the underlying purpose of Rule 15 — 24 25 2 Defendant is a corporation organized and existing under the laws of Taiwan and 26 maintains its principal place of business at No. 13, Ln. 68, Neixi Rd., Luzhu Dist. 27 || Taoyuan City 33852, Taiwan. (Doc. No. | ¥ 2.) 5g 3 Plaintiff asserts claims of infringement as to the ‘302, ‘473, ‘318, and ‘840 Patents. (See Doc. No. 1.) | ||to facilitate a decision on the merits rather than on the pleadings or technicalities.”). 2 || “This policy is ‘to be applied with extreme liberality.”” Eminence Capital, LLC v. 3 Aspeon, Inc., 316 F.3d 1048, 1051 (9th Cir. 2003) (quoting Owens v,. Kaiser Found. 4 || Health Plan, Inc., 244 F.3d 708, 712 (9th Cir. 2001)). Courts consider “undue delay, bad _ 5 || faith, dilatory motive, repeated failure to cure deficiencies by previous amendments, 6 || undue prejudice to the opposing party, and futility of the proposed amendment” in 7 jj deciding whether justice requires granting leave to amend under Rule 15. Moore v. 8 || Kayport Package Express, Inc,, 885 F.3d 531, 538 (9th Cir. 1989) (citing Fomanyv. 9 || Davis, 370 U.S. 178, 182 (1962)). In addition, under LR 7.1, failure to respond “may 10 || constitute a consent to the granting of the motion.” ‘11 Here, since the Defendant has not responded to the Motion, the Court will deem 12 || the Defendant's lack of response to mean it does not éppose the Plaintiff's Motion. Thus, 13 || Defendants have in essence consented to the Court granting the Motion. The Court also. 14 || finds grounds to grant Plaintiff leave to amend his Complaint. There is no apparent bad 15 || faith or undue delay in the Motion for Leave to Amend. The amendments do not appear 16 || to prejudice the Defendant. The Plaintiff's amendments do not appear to be futile, □□ 17 || Plaintiff has provided facially plausible grounds to add the new claims to his Complaint. 18 || This is Plaintiff's first Motion for Leave to Amend the Complaint. . 19 CONCLUSION 20 IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that the Motion is GRANTED. The proposed First 21 |} Amended Complaint, adding the new claims shall be filed. Plaintiff shall file the First 22 || Amended Complaint within seven (7) days of the date of this Order. ITISSO ORDERED. 24 Dated: J anon 2020 2 25 [Mey MCE. Lo Hon, Roget. Benitez □ 26 . “ United States District Judgé 27 28 | .