How a Winning Patent Verdict Lost Its Remedy: Injunctions and Irreparable Harm After Wonderland

Dale Chang, partner | Russ August & Kabat

Dale Chang is a partner at Russ August & Kabat whose practice focuses on high-stakes patent and trade secrets litigation. He represents both plaintiffs and defendants in complex intellectual property disputes and has successfully litigated cases in every major U.S. patent forum, including federal district courts, the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC), and the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB). With significant first-chair and trial experience, Dale has played key roles in more than 20 trials involving cutting-edge technologies across numerous industries.

• Education & Credentials

Dale is an experienced intellectual property litigator whose practice centers on patent infringement, trade secret litigation, PTAB proceedings, and ITC investigations. Prior to joining Russ August & Kabat, he served as counsel at Latham & Watkins LLP, where he spent more than 15 years litigating complex IP disputes.

• Recognition & Leadership

Dale has established a distinguished record of success in high-value patent litigation. He was instrumental in securing a $175 million jury verdict for Headwater Research against Verizon in 2025 and a $279 million jury verdict for Headwater Research against Samsung the same year. In 2024, he helped obtain a $262 million jury verdict, followed by a $380 million judgment, against Western Digital in a patent infringement case involving hard disk drive technology. He has also achieved a 100% win rate in the PTAB trials he has first-chaired, underscoring his leadership in post-grant patent proceedings.

• Professional Involvement

Dale regularly represents clients in patent litigation before federal district courts, the ITC, and the PTAB. His work spans patent infringement actions, inter partes review (IPR) proceedings, post-grant reviews (PGR), and trade secret disputes involving sophisticated technologies. He has represented leading technology companies and innovators in matters involving telecommunications, semiconductor technology, consumer electronics, electric vehicle batteries, software, networking, and anti-virus technology.

• Experience

Dale has extensive experience trying complex patent and trade secret cases involving a broad range of technologies. His recent successes include jury verdicts for Headwater Research against Verizon and Samsung, a landmark verdict and judgment against Western Digital, complete defense victories for Irving Consumer Products and SMR, and a plaintiff-side victory for Philip Morris in a vaping technology dispute. He also successfully first-chaired an inter partes review that invalidated all asserted patent claims after the patent owner had prevailed before the ITC, and has secured multiple PTAB victories in post-grant proceedings. His trade secret experience includes representing LG Chem in its landmark ITC victory against SK Innovation involving electric vehicle battery technology. Earlier in his career, he represented clients in significant disputes such as InterDigital v. ZTE, Xperi v. Samsung, AMD’s cross-license dispute with Intel, and Symantec v. Computer Associates, achieving favorable verdicts, settlements, and strategic victories in complex intellectual property litigation.

Brian Ledahl, Partner | Russ August & Kabat

Brian Ledahl is a partner in the Los Angeles office of Russ August & Kabat, where his practice centers on intellectual property and litigation, with particular emphasis on high-technology patent matters and entertainment disputes. His work spans patent infringement, copyright infringement, trade secrets, and entertainment litigation, at trial and on appeal.

• Education & Credentials

Mr. Ledahl received his J.D. from Columbia Law School in 1996, where he was named a Harlan Fiske Stone Scholar and served as a judicial extern to the Hon. Sonia Sotomayor. He earned his Bachelors Degree from Columbia University in 1993. He is admitted in the state and Federal Courts in California, the Federal Courts in the Eastern and Western Districts of Texas, the District of Colorado, the U.S. Courts of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and the Federal Circuit, and the United States Supreme Court.

• Recognition & Leadership

The publishers of Los Angeles Magazine have named him a Southern California Super Lawyer each year from 2014 through 2026, and in 2021 he was recognized as a Southern California Top 100 Super Lawyer. Martindale has peer rated him AV Preeminent. As an undergraduate he was a member of Columbia’s 1992 and 1993 NCAA Champion fencing teams and received the Eisenhower Scholar Athlete Award.

• Professional Involvement

Alongside his litigation practice, Mr. Ledahl counsels clients on business and strategic issues arising from intellectual property and related matters. He has served on the board of the Los Angeles Children’s Chorus.

• Experience

Mr. Ledahl has appeared in numerous Federal trial courts around the United States, in state courts in California, and before the U.S. International Trade Commission. His recent trial results include a $135mm judgment in AlmondNet v. Amazon, a $379mm judgment in MR Technologies v. Western Digital, a $279mm verdict in Headwater Research v. Samsung, and a $175mm verdict in Headwater Research v. Verizon. His appellate record includes successful arguments against Apple, Google, and many others before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, as well as appeals before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and the California state appellate courts. He recently argued before the Federal Circuit sitting en banc in EcoFactor v. Google. Over the course of his career he has helped clients recover more than $3.4 billion in judgments and settlements. Before joining Russ August & Kabat, he practiced at Irell & Manella LLP from 1996 to 2013.

SESSION 1 – Building an irreparable-harm record that survives federal circuit review | 12:00pm – 1:00pm

This session examines what it takes to build an irreparable-harm evidentiary record that can withstand Federal Circuit scrutiny in a post-eBay, post-Wonderland landscape. Using Wonderland Switzerland AG v. Evenflo Company, Inc. (Fed. Cir. Dec. 17, 2025) as the organizing case, attorneys will work through each eBay factor—with particular focus on the causal nexus requirement, the evidentiary categories courts demand, and the mistakes that cost winning patentees their injunctions. Attorneys will leave with a concrete framework for gathering, structuring, and presenting irreparable-harm evidence from discovery through the injunction hearing.

This session examines willful patent infringement after Halo, focusing on how courts evaluate enhanced damages, the strategic value of clearance opinions, privilege waiver risks, opinion counsel structures, and the continued role of the Read factors in mitigating willfulness and damages exposure.

BREAK | 1:00pm – 1:10pm ET

SESSION 2 – When an Injunction Isn’t Available – Navigating Patent Damages Presentation | 1:10pm – 2:10pm

This section focuses on how to present damages in a case where an injunction isn’t available or was reversed, how to navigate the different types of reasonable royalty structures and approaches, possible design around issues, and the common pitfalls around presenting royalty damages.

This session examines the remedies available to patent owners when a permanent injunction is unavailable, with a particular focus on securing and calculating ongoing monetary relief. Attendees will explore the distinctions between pre-verdict and post-verdict damages, including how litigation strategy, evidentiary requirements, and legal standards evolve after liability has been established. The program will also explain the concept of sunset royalties, how they differ from ongoing royalties, and the circumstances in which each may be appropriate. In addition, the session will address practical challenges related to design-around efforts, recent developments affecting damages experts—including the impact of the EcoFactor v. Google decision on Daubert challenges—and effective strategies for presenting damages evidence at trial to preserve the possibility of an ongoing royalty award if injunctive relief is denied.