Chicago, IL, February 2010 – Kotchen & Low LLP represents Technology Research Group (“TRG”) in a lawsuit filed by the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (“CME”) and Chicago Board of Trade (“CBOT”). TRG owns United States Patent No. 5,963,923, which claims an electronic trading system (and method) involving a “principal market maker.” A principal market maker is an organization designated by an exchange to maintain a two-sided bid/offer market in an exchange-traded product in return for priority volume benefits – e.g., a guaranteed minimum percentage of the product’s trading volume.
The CME and CBOT filed a declaratory judgment action alleging that the ‘923 patent is invalid and not infringed. TRG filed a counterclaim alleging that the CME and CBOT infringe the ‘923 patent. The parties are awaiting a claims construction decision from the Court. The parties’ claims construction briefs can be reviewed here: TRG and CME/CBOT.