Overview
(Washington, DC, June 29, 2026) — Steptoe LLP today announced that a $170M jury verdict secured by Steptoe on behalf of its client, Express Mobile, Inc., led to yet another significant win in a high stakes patent dispute before the US Patent and Trademark Office's Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB). In November 2025, and after six years of litigation against GoDaddy.com, LLC, including a successful appeal to the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, Steptoe secured a unanimous verdict in favor of Express Mobile, where the jury found infringement of US Patent No. 7,594,168 and no invalidity and awarded the full damage sought. Now, in a Final Written Decision issued on June 25, 2026, the PTAB relied on the jury's determination that the claims of the '168 patent are not invalid to hold that several petitioners failed to prove unpatentability over the same prior art and arguments, delivering another decisive victory for Express Mobile.
The decision follows years of litigation and challenges to Express Mobile's patents widely recognized as foundational to modern web design and development technology. In parallel to litigation between Express Mobile and GoDaddy.com, a coalition of major technology companies, including Facebook and Google, challenged the '168 patent in a series of related inter partes reviews (IPR). The PTAB twice found the claims unpatentable – first during the initial IPR proceedings and then again on remand after Express Mobile successfully appealed to the Federal Circuit. Express Mobile then requested Director Review of the PTAB's second Final Written Decision, which the Director delegated to a Delegated Review Panel. Upon reconsideration, the Delegated Review Panel accounted for Express Mobile's $170M jury verdict over GoDaddy.com finding that claims of the '168 patent were not invalid over the same prior art and arguments presented in the IPRs, and concluded that the petitioners failed to present materially different evidence or arguments to justify a different outcome and therefore failed to prove that the claims of the '168 patent are unpatentable.
“The decision is first-of-its-kind and underscores recent policy shifts at the Patent Office intended to avoid the risk of inconsistent decisions when other forums already have adjudicated the validity of the challenged patent" said Jay Nuttall lead trial counsel for Express Mobile.
It also marks a pivotal moment in Express Mobile's ongoing enforcement of its foundational web-design patents and reinforces Express Mobile's ability to defend its patented technology against repeated validity challenges. By vacating its earlier decisions and ruling in favor of Express Mobile, the PTAB emphasized the importance of consistency across tribunals when the same issues and evidence are presented. The decision further solidifies Express Mobile's intellectual property position in the competitive mobile website development space.
The Steptoe team representing Express Mobile against GoDaddy.com is led by partner Jay Nuttall, and includes partners John Abramic, Kate Tellez, Robert Kappers, and Christopher Suarez.
About Steptoe
In more than 110 years of practice, Steptoe has earned an international reputation for vigorous representation of clients and innovative thinking before governmental agencies, successful advocacy in litigation and arbitration, and creative and practical advice in structuring business transactions. Steptoe has more than 500 lawyers and other professional staff across offices in Beijing, Brussels, Chicago, Hong Kong, Houston, London, Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco, and Washington, DC. For more information, visit www.steptoe.com.
