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Fortinet, Inc. v. SRI Int'l, Inc.

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT Northern District of California
Mar 27, 2013
No. C 12-02540 JSW (MEJ) (N.D. Cal. Mar. 27, 2013)

Opinion

No. C 12-02540 JSW (MEJ) No. C 12-03231-JSW (MEJ)

03-27-2013

FORTINET, INC, Plaintiff, v. SRI INTERNATIONAL, INC, Defendant. CHECK POINT SOFTWARE TECHNOLOGIES INC., Plaintiff, v. SRI INTERNATIONAL, INC, Defendant.


DISCOVERY ORDER

On February 7, 2013, the parties filed a pair of discovery letters regarding Plaintiffs' responses to SRI's Interrogatories 8 and 9 and its request for Production 11, 26, 58, and 66, seeking information and documents relating to customers for the accused products in this case. Because the parties had failed to meet and confer before filing their letters, on March 11, 2013, the Court issued an order requiring the parties to appear in court to meet and attempt to resolve their dispute. Dkt. No. 63. On March 15, 2013, the parties met for several hours and were able to come to an agreement on several issues; however, certain matters remain unresolved. Consequently, following their meet and confer session, the parties filed the instant letter outlining the issues that remain in dispute. Dkt. No. 64

In the letter, SRI indicates that Plaintiffs "have agreed to produce customer and Accused Product specific revenue data from the date SRI provided notice of infringement forward. Plaintiffs also agree to compile and produce aggregate sales revenue from 2006 forward for the accused products identified in SRI's infringement contentions." SRI further explains that Plaintiffs "also agree to extract and produce the documents on the Accused Products contained within their customer support databases within a time frame as set out [in the letter]." While SRI believes that this production may be useful in advancing the discovery process forward, it indicates that it still needs to review the information and may renew its motion to compel production if it finds that the information produced is deficient.

The parties, however, have been unable to resolve the issue regarding email production in response to SRI's requests for customer-related documents. According to SRI, Plaintiffs have refused to search any email from employees who may have communicated with customers to induce them to use the products in an infringing manner and have not identified persons/employees with relevant customer-related information. Plaintiffs, in response, argue that SRI's requests for production are "exceedingly broad in scope . . . and especially burdensome given the size of Check Point and Fortinet and the number of customers." Plaintiffs state that they agreed to search email if SRI will provide search terms and specify custodians, but SRI has refused to do so. Plaintiffs also request that the Court enter a version of the Federal Circuit Model Order or Northern District of California Model Order adopting limits on custodians and search terms.

The Court has considered the parties' positions, and rules as follows. Within five days of this Order, Fortinet and Check Point shall identify to SRI any employees/custodians who are known to have customer information responsive to SRI's requests. Thereafter, email production shall proceed consistent with the following framework.

1. Email production requests shall identify the custodian, search terms, and time frame. The parties shall cooperate to identify the proper custodians, proper search terms and proper timeframe.

2. Each requesting party shall limit its first email production requests to a total of ten (10) custodians per producing party for all such requests. Sixty (60) days after the receipt of initial documents responsive to the first set of email production requests, a party may make additional email production requests to five (5) custodians. The five custodians who receive the additional email production requests may include custodians from whom documents have already been requested. The parties may jointly agree to modify these limits without the Court's leave. The Court shall consider contested requests for up to five (5) additional custodians per producing party, upon showing a distinct need based on the size, complexity, and issues of this specific case. Should a party serve email production requests for additional custodians beyond the limits agreed to by the parties or granted by the Court pursuant to this paragraph, the requesting party shall bear all reasonable costs caused by such additional discovery.

3. Each requesting party shall limit its first email production requests to a total of twenty (20) search terms per custodian per party. Each requesting party shall limit its additional email production requests to a total of five (5) search terms per custodian per party. The parties may jointly agree to modify these limits without the Court's leave. The Court shall consider contested requests for up to five (10) additional search terms per custodian, upon showing a distinct need based on the size, complexity, and issues of this specific case. The search terms shall be narrowly tailored to particular issues. Indiscriminate terms, such as the producing company's name or its product name, are inappropriate unless combined with narrowing search criteria that sufficiently reduce the risk of overproduction. A conjunctive combination of multiple words or phrases (e.g., "computer" and "system") narrows the search and shall count as a single search term. A disjunctive combination of multiple words or phrases (e.g., "computer" or "system") broadens the search, and thus each word or phrase shall count as a separate search term unless they are variants of the same word. Use of narrowing search criteria (e.g., "and," "but not," "w/x") is encouraged to limit the production and shall be considered when determining whether to shift costs for disproportionate discovery. Should a party serve email production requests with search terms beyond the limits agreed to by the parties or granted by the Court pursuant to this paragraph, the requesting party shall bear all reasonable costs caused by such additional discovery.

IT IS SO ORDERED.

______________________

Maria-Elena James

United States Magistrate Judge


Summaries of

Fortinet, Inc. v. SRI Int'l, Inc.

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT Northern District of California
Mar 27, 2013
No. C 12-02540 JSW (MEJ) (N.D. Cal. Mar. 27, 2013)
Case details for

Fortinet, Inc. v. SRI Int'l, Inc.

Case Details

Full title:FORTINET, INC, Plaintiff, v. SRI INTERNATIONAL, INC, Defendant. CHECK…

Court:UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT Northern District of California

Date published: Mar 27, 2013

Citations

No. C 12-02540 JSW (MEJ) (N.D. Cal. Mar. 27, 2013)