ITC judge presiding over Kodak-Apple patent case retires

ITC Chief Administrative Law Judge Paul Luckern has stepped down from his position after 27 years of service. This departure is notable as Luckern presided over the patent complaint filed by Kodak against Apple.

In January, Luckern issued an initial ruling that Apple did not infringe on Kodak's patent for image preview. This early win for Apple was surprising as Kodak had collected over US$900 million from LG and Samsung in licensing fees for this same image preview patent.

The final decision on this complaint has been delayed twice and is now scheduled for the end of August. With the departure of the presiding judge, the outcome of this case is uncertain and could swing in favor of Kodak. Such a reversal would be a huge win for the imaging company as licensing fees from this complaint could climb as high as $1 billion.