Business
This episode features an interview with Sarah Tsou, who is an investment manager for patent litigation at the world’s leading litigation funder, Bentham IMF (now part of Omni Bridgeway Limited). The playbook is simple for deep-pocketed defendants facing lawsuits from patent owners with limited resources. Even if a patent owner has a very strong case, the defendant can just drag the case out long enough until the patent owner and his lawyers run out of resources to continue. At best, the patent owners are forced to settle lawsuits for a fraction of what they think they are owed. Patent litigation funders have changed this calculus by providing patent owners with enough resources. However, as you will hear in this episode, only 1% of cases have the rare mix of merits and economics to receive funding from top litigation funders. This episode is especially relevant because of the pressure many in-house patent litigation attorneys are facing to settle or give up because of shrinking budgets due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Eli and Sarah discuss how patent litigation funding can serve as an attractive alternative for companies that are in this position.