## Facts

- CBT Flint Partners, LLC sued Return Path, Inc. and Cisco IronPort Systems, LLC for patent infringement in federal court.
- During discovery, IronPort hired a third-party consultant to perform electronic discovery work involving electronically stored information (ESI).
- CBT did not prevail, and the defendants were treated as prevailing parties for cost purposes.
- The Clerk taxed costs against CBT under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 54(d)(1) and 28 U.S.C. § 1920, including IronPort’s vendor e-discovery charges as “exemplification and copies” under § 1920(4).
- CBT moved for district-court review of the taxation of costs, disputing the inclusion of IronPort’s e-discovery consulting fees.

## Issues

1. Whether, and to what extent, third-party e-discovery vendor charges are taxable under 28 U.S.C. § 1920(4) as “fees for exemplification and the costs of making copies.”
2. Which vendor tasks (e.g., imaging and format conversion versus data collection, processing, searching, de-duplication, and project management) qualify as taxable “copying” rather than non-taxable litigation services.

## Decision

- The court granted CBT’s motion in part and denied it in part.
- The court held that only vendor charges directly tied to producing electronic copies for production (such as imaging and file format conversion) were taxable under § 1920(4).
- The court held that broader e-discovery services (including data collection, processing, keyword searching, de-duplication, and project management) were not taxable.
- The court reduced the e-discovery costs taxed against CBT to exclude non-taxable vendor services.

## Legal Principles

- Rule 54(d)(1) creates a presumption in favor of awarding costs to the prevailing party, but only within the categories authorized by 28 U.S.C. § 1920.
- Section 1920 must be construed narrowly; a court lacks authority to tax costs not enumerated by Congress.
- Under § 1920(4), taxable e-discovery costs are limited to the functional equivalent of “making copies” for production (e.g., imaging and converting ESI into producible formats).
- Vendor work that functions as discovery management or professional support (e.g., collecting ESI, processing and culling data, running searches, de-duplication, and coordinating methodologies) is not taxable as “copying” or “exemplification.”

## Conclusion

The court treated § 1920(4) as authorizing taxation of only those e-discovery vendor expenses that are directly part of creating producible electronic copies, while excluding vendor tasks that resemble litigation support services rather than copying.


CBT Flint Partners, LLC v. Return Path, Inc., 676 F. Supp. 2d 1376 (N.D. Ga. 2009)