Rothstein Discusses Arnold & Porter's Precedent-Setting Online Gaming Patent Victory

Intellectual Property & Technology partner Evan Rothstein was quoted in Law360 discussing his recent victory on behalf of BetMGM at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. Online gaming trade publications Gambling News and PlayUSA also covered the win.

In the case, Beteiro, LLC, a patent assertion entity, had pursued infringement suits against BetMGM, DraftKings, Fan Duel, UniBet, and others in the online gaming industry, asserting that they infringed several of Beteiro's patents relating to the usage of GPS technology to verify location in mobile online gaming applications. After the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey dismissed the case in 2022, Beteiro appealed the decision to the Federal Circuit. A New Jersey federal judge recently affirmed the district court's ruling, finding that Beteiro's GPS patents cannot meet patentability requirements.

Regarding the Federal Circuit's decision, Rothstein told Law360 that "the court went further than it needed to affirm the lower court." Beteiro had tried to "artfully plead that the dearth of information in the patents themselves about GPS [was sufficient]," he continued. "What Judge Stark has done here is announce a definitely favorable standard for the issue of the inventive concept. It's going to require plaintiffs in patent infringement cases to actually tie a complaint's allegations of inventive concept to language that's actually in the patents' specification."

Read the full Law360 article, "Fed. Circ. Backs DraftKings, FanDuel Alice Win Over GPS IP" (subscription required).

Read the full Gambling News article, "Court of Appeals Sides with US Betting Operators in Infringement Case."

Read the full PlayUSA article, "Federal Court's Ruling Strengthens' Public Domain' Status Of Geolocation Technology For Online Gambling."