Overview
Shamita Etienne-Cummings is a partner in the Intellectual Property practice at Paul Hastings and is based in the firm’s Washington, D.C. office. She serves technology clients by drawing on her business, technical and legal acumen developed over 30 plus years in engineering, law and management. Her experience enables her to take a client-focused business practical approach leading her to become a trusted advisor to many leading global technology companies.
Ms. Etienne-Cummings is consistently recognized as a World’s Leading Patent Professionals by IAM Patent 1000 and has earned praises from clients: “Notching up win after win, Shamita is great - she is very aggressive and not shy about going after the best result for her client with all she’s got.” She is also ranked as a Patent Star on Managing IP's IP Stars list and is listed among the top 100 International Trade Commission (ITC) practitioners in the last five years, according to Patexia’s ITC Intelligence Report 2022. She is ranked as a leading individual by Chambers USA, with clients remarking “I really do appreciate her strategic advice with respect to very complex and broad-reaching litigation disputes. She's very good at considering the long-term impact and the overall business needs."
Ms. Etienne-Cummings’ industry experience focuses on mobile communication, semiconductor design and processing, media, aerospace, defense, consumer electronic devices and medical devices. She draws on her deep technical knowledge, based on her previous work as an electrical engineer and program manager for GTE Corporation in the mobile telecommunications industry, where she designed and implemented wireless communication and satellite systems.
In addition to being a first chair patent litigator, Ms. Etienne-Cummings represents clients in breach of contract and trade secret matters before district courts, the ITC and the International Commercial Court (ICC), and routinely provides advice to clients on general patent diligence matters.
Ms. Etienne-Cummings is an adjunct professor of law at George Washington University School of Law where she teaches a patent trial course.
Recognitions
- Ranked Among the Top 250 Federal Circuit Attorneys, Patexia, 2024
- Intellectual Property: Litigation DC, Chambers USA
- United States: National—International Trade Commission, IAM Patent 1000
- United States: DC Metro Area—Litigation, IAM Patent 1000
- Managing Intellectual Property, Patent Star
Representations
- Lead counsel in obtaining complete victories in 2 back-to-back ITC trials for Google against Ecofactor involving Smart Thermostats.
- Lead counsel in obtaining complete victory in an ITC trial for Google against Nokia involving smartphone mobile technology.
- Lead counsel in obtaining a complete victory at summary determination stage for Google against Nokia involving AI natural language processing technology for mobile devices.
- Lead counsel defending Google’s customers (Samsung, HTC and LG) against Enterprise Systems Technologies involving mobile services on smartphones. The Investigation settled favorably shortly after the Judge granted summary determination on one of the three asserted patents.
- Lead counsel in obtaining a complete victory at summary determination stage for Walmart against Regents of the University of California involving Filament LEDs.
- Lead counsel defending Xi'an Brightway Energy Equipment and Brightway Solids Control against M-I L.L.C. patent infringement claims involving shaker screens for drilling fluids. The Investigation settled favorably.
- Lead counsel defending Suzhou Real Power Electric Appliance against iRobot's patent infringement claims relating to smart robotic vacuum cleaners. The Investigation settled favorably.
- Lead counsel for Panasonic in consecutive ITC investigation against Freescale involving semiconductor process and chip technology. The Investigation settled favorably.
- Lead counsel representing JPMorgan in a complex multidistrict litigation against Maxim Integrated Products involving secure data transmissions for mobile banking applications.
- Lead counsel for Toshiba and Kioxia in various PTAB and district court litigations relating to semiconductor processing and chip technology.
- Lead counsel for LG entities in a patent case relating to smart GPS technology and navigation applications.
- Lead counsel for American Express in concurrent district court and PTAB proceedings involving patents regarding secure financial transactions. Court granted motion to dismiss early in the litigation.
Matters may have been handled prior to joining Paul Hastings.