Published on Jan 3, 2020 One of the more significant case law developments in recent months involves an order that
U.S. Magistrate Judge Mitchell D. Dembin issued in
NuVasive, Inc. v. Alphatec Holdings, Inc. addressing a search term and custodian dispute in a patent litigation suit. Judge Dembin’s order, which criticizes email discovery provisions from a model eDiscovery order, spotlights the importance of both understanding and using advanced search methodologies and analytics tools in eDiscovery.
NuVasive v. Alphatec Holdings
In NuVasive, the parties had a “general agreement” to abide by
the Model Order Governing Discovery of Electronically Stored Information in Patent Cases, a set of electronic discovery guidelines that the
Federal Circuit Advisory Council promulgated over eight years ago. The provisions in the Model Order addressing email discovery, which limit a requesting party to five custodians (which it must identify) and five search terms, gave rise to the parties’ discovery dispute. In reliance on the Model Order, plaintiff moved to compel defendants to use the search terms it designed. Plaintiff also sought to determine the appropriateness of the custodians that it identified.
The court rejected plaintiff’s motion, finding its reliance on the Model Order was misplaced given the Order’s systemic deficiencies regarding email discovery. As an initial matter, the court determined that the Model Order’s disclosure and limitation mandates relating to custodians and search terms to be inconsistent with the strictures of Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 34, which do not require “a requesting party to identify custodians or search terms.”
The court next observed that the Model Order contravened eDiscovery best practices as memorialized in The Sedona Principles.
[1] By coercing requesting parties to unilaterally designate custodians and develop search terms, the court found the Model Order to be inconsistent with Sedona Principle 6, which empowers the responding party to handle the production of its information, and Sedona Principle 3, which encourages parties “to reach agreement regarding production of electronically stored information.”
In closing its order, the court criticized the Model Order for its exclusive reliance on search terms as the approach for addressing email discovery. While observing that “search terms have their place,” the court explained that “electronic discovery has moved well beyond search terms” and that the Model Order’s exclusive reliance on this one search methodology made it “obsolete.”
Lessons from NuVasive
The NuVasive decision is instructive on multiple levels. NuVasive calls into question the continuing viability of the Model Order guidelines for email discovery in patent litigation. Drawing on criticisms that
Ralph Losey offered many years ago on the Model Order’s reliance on arbitrary search term restrictions and blind keyword searches, NuVasive counsels parties to follow both the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure and the “learned views” from The Sedona Principles on electronic discovery, including the development of search terms.
NuVasive also emphasizes the need for counsel to understand and use search methodologies and analytics tools beyond search terms. The availability of technology-assisted review (TAR), email threading, concept search, near duplicate identification, data clustering, and other search methods and tools underscores Judge Dembin’s declaration that “electronic discovery has moved well beyond search terms.” Facility with other methodologies and tools will inevitably lead to better results in terms of cost, efficiency, and effectiveness in discovery process.
[1] See
The Sedona Principles, Third Edition: Best Practices, Recommendations & Principles for Addressing Electronic Document Production, 19 Sedona Conf. J. 1 (2018).
