Apple Inc. general counsel Bruce Sewell pitched an idea for making corporate litigation more efficient: break it into phases and avoid multiple, simultaneous discovery processes.

 

“There are many cases in which cost is a more important function of efficiency than speed, and if we focus too heavily on speed, some things become counterproductive, and you can end up parallel processing,” Sewell told an audience of lawyers and legal professionals at Stanford Law School. “The sense is that, to get to an end point by a certain time, we do everything now. If you parallel everything, almost, by definition, you'll end up with redundancy.”

 

Sewell was participating in a group discussion with other Bay Area in-house lawyers as part of “General Counsel & The Courts a Dialogue,” an event sponsored by a bevy of law firms and hosted by both the law school and the Federal Bar Association. He was joined on the panel by Nest Labs Inc. general counsel Richard “Chip” Lutton, Genentech Inc. general counsel Sean Johnston, HP Inc. chief legal officer Kim Rivera and Stanford University general counsel Debra Zumwalt.

 

Sewell explained a common discrepancy between how judges and in-house counsel define efficiency itself. One side often cares about costs. The other, about calendars.

 

“In some cases, for very logical reasons, like if the judges are used to dealing with a criminal calendar and life and liberty issues, they see the speed to resolution as the most important factor in efficiency,” Sewell said.

 

Sewell proposed that judges and opposing counsel coordinate to find “what drives the decisions” in pending litigation—factors that could affect possible settlements, Sewell said—and then to target those and try to resolve them before going to trial.

 

Rivera, HP's lead lawyer, said this targeted method would also help her company run better. She said for prolonged litigation she sometimes has to pull executives and employees away from their daily duties to provide information needed in a pending lawsuit.

 

“There is a great deal of inefficiency and cost in that,” Rivera said. “It weighs heavy on us.”

 

Johnston, Genentech's GC, agreed with Nest Labs GC Lutton that the counsel on both sides should take the initiative in talking to one another and trying to set up informal “phasing,” focusing on discovery processes that are at the core of a client's argument.

 

But, Johnston said, judges handling discovery can help facilitate that.

 

“This is something we've all experienced, where we believe we've spent a lot of money on discovery that ultimately led nowhere and probably could've been identified as such earlier, with the help of the court and magistrate judges, asking questions at the outset: Where is this headed? What are the theories of the case?” Johnston said. “With that context, look into phasing some discovery to make it less burdensome and costly, and still deliver justice and get to the right result.”

Apple Inc. general counsel Bruce Sewell pitched an idea for making corporate litigation more efficient: break it into phases and avoid multiple, simultaneous discovery processes.

 

“There are many cases in which cost is a more important function of efficiency than speed, and if we focus too heavily on speed, some things become counterproductive, and you can end up parallel processing,” Sewell told an audience of lawyers and legal professionals at Stanford Law School. “The sense is that, to get to an end point by a certain time, we do everything now. If you parallel everything, almost, by definition, you'll end up with redundancy.”

 

Sewell was participating in a group discussion with other Bay Area in-house lawyers as part of “General Counsel & The Courts a Dialogue,” an event sponsored by a bevy of law firms and hosted by both the law school and the Federal Bar Association. He was joined on the panel by Nest Labs Inc. general counsel Richard “Chip” Lutton, Genentech Inc. general counsel Sean Johnston, HP Inc. chief legal officer Kim Rivera and Stanford University general counsel Debra Zumwalt.

 

Sewell explained a common discrepancy between how judges and in-house counsel define efficiency itself. One side often cares about costs. The other, about calendars.

 

“In some cases, for very logical reasons, like if the judges are used to dealing with a criminal calendar and life and liberty issues, they see the speed to resolution as the most important factor in efficiency,” Sewell said.

 

Sewell proposed that judges and opposing counsel coordinate to find “what drives the decisions” in pending litigation—factors that could affect possible settlements, Sewell said—and then to target those and try to resolve them before going to trial.

 

Rivera, HP's lead lawyer, said this targeted method would also help her company run better. She said for prolonged litigation she sometimes has to pull executives and employees away from their daily duties to provide information needed in a pending lawsuit.

 

“There is a great deal of inefficiency and cost in that,” Rivera said. “It weighs heavy on us.”

 

Johnston, Genentech's GC, agreed with Nest Labs GC Lutton that the counsel on both sides should take the initiative in talking to one another and trying to set up informal “phasing,” focusing on discovery processes that are at the core of a client's argument.

 

But, Johnston said, judges handling discovery can help facilitate that.

 

“This is something we've all experienced, where we believe we've spent a lot of money on discovery that ultimately led nowhere and probably could've been identified as such earlier, with the help of the court and magistrate judges, asking questions at the outset: Where is this headed? What are the theories of the case?” Johnston said. “With that context, look into phasing some discovery to make it less burdensome and costly, and still deliver justice and get to the right result.”