Overview
Rohit Nath leads groundbreaking litigation across the United States. For plaintiffs, he has recovered over $500 million, taking on the world’s largest technology companies, insurers, international wireless carriers, and more. On the defense side, Nath has represented Fortune 500 companies in cases with billions at stake. Nath has been named a California Lawyer of the Year (Daily Journal), a Rising Star of the Plaintiffs Bar (NLJ), a Sports and Entertainment Litigation Trailblazer (NLJ), and a Top Intellectual Property Lawyer (Daily Journal).
Most recently, Nath has been at the forefront of artificial intelligence litigation. This includes Bartz v. Anthropic, where he co-led a Susman Godfrey team that secured a $1.5 billion settlement, which, if approved, will be the largest reported copyright settlement in history.
LANDMARK AI LITIGATION
In a historic copyright infringement action, Nath co-led a team from Susman Godfrey to secure a $1.5 billion settlement for rightsholders whose books were downloaded by Anthropic from pirated databases. The settlement is subject to court approval and, if approved, would be the largest reported settlement in copyright history. Nath and his co-lead counsel were named Litigators of the Week by Law.com for this precedent-setting result.
Nath argued successfully in opposition to Anthropic’s summary judgment motion on fair use, which paved the way for the settlement. Read more in the New York Times, Bloomberg, and Law.com.
Nath is also leading litigation related to copyright infringement and artificial intelligence in In re OpenAI Inc. Copyright Infringement Litigation, where he represents a group of prominent writers—including the John Grisham, David Baldacci, Jonathan Franzen, and Pulitzer Prize winners Stacy Schiff and Kai Bird—against OpenAI and Microsoft. Nath also co-leads AI copyright cases against Databricks and NVIDIA.
In Doe v. Mindgeek, Nath represents a certified class of minors against the world’s largest online pornography company. The case alleges that Mindgeek promoted and profited from the distribution of child pornography on its websites. In July 2024, Nath argued summary judgment on cutting edge issues of Section 230.
WINS FOR INSURANCE POLICYHOLDERS
Nath helped secure a $307.5 million deal against AXA for victims of an life insurance rate increase targeting elderly insureds. The settlement came after nearly seven years of litigation, and after plaintiffs succeeded on class certification and defeated summary judgment.
In 37 Besen Parkway LLC v. John Hancock Life Insurance Co, Nath helped secure a settlement of $91.25 million (before fees and expenses) for a certified class of insurance policy owners against John Hancock Life Insurance Company. In the final approval order, Judge Paul Gardephe described the settlement as a “quite extraordinary . . . result achieved on behalf of the class.” You can read more about the case here (subscription required).
DEFENSE-SIDE LITIGATION
On the defense side, Nath has represented some of the largest companies in their biggest disputes. In 2021, Nath represented Match Group in a nearly four week jury trial over a multi-billion dispute related to the founding of the popular dating app Tinder. In 2025, Nath represented Chevron U.S.A. in a property dispute in Kern County, where Nath argued and won key motions on the eve of trial.
PRO BONO
Nath previously received a Public Counsel Pro Bono award for his work defending the COVID-19 mortarium in the City of Los Angeles and other moratoria across the state. In Apartment Association of Greater Los Angeles.v. City of Los Angeles, Nath helped secure the first federal appellate decision upholding a COVID-19 eviction moratorium in the country.
The Daily Journal profiled Nath and his colleagues for their work in this area and named them a California Lawyer Attorney of the Year in 2023 for their critical work. Read more in the San Francisco Chronicle and Law360 (subscription required).
BACKGROUND
Nath joined Susman Godfrey after working as a trial attorney at the U.S. Department of Justice and as a law clerk for Judge Alex Kozinski (Ret.) on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. He graduated with high honors from The University of Chicago Law School, where he served as editor-in-chief of The University of Chicago Law Review.
Before law school, he taught eighth-grade math in Oklahoma as a Teach for America corps member. Nath is a longtime board member of the South Asian Bar Association of Southern California and served as co-president during the 2021-2022 term. He is also a member of the Executive Committee of the Litigation Section of the Los Angeles County Bar Association.
Notable Representations
- In re AXA Equitable Life Insurance Company COI Litigation (S.D.N.Y) Secured a $307.5 million deal for a putative class of plaintiffs who challenged AXA’s 2016 hike of cost on insurance rates on hundreds of elderly insureds, claiming AXA unfairly increased the cost of insurance for certain flexible-premium universal life insurance policies.
- Helen Hanks v. Voya Retirement Insurance and Annuity Company (S.D.N.Y.) Secured settlement worth $118 million, before fees and expenses, including a cash fund of over $92 million and an agreement by Voya not to impose a higher rate scale for 5 years, on behalf of a certified class of 46,000+ policyholders over allegations that Voya improperly raised cost-of-insurance charges.
- 37 Bensen Parkway v. John Hancock Life Insurance Company (S.D.N.Y) Secured a $91.25 million settlement all-cash, non-reversionary settlement (before fees and expenses) for insurance policy owners against John Hancock Life Insurance Company. The Honorable Paul Gardephe described the settlement as a “quite extraordinary . . . result achieved on behalf of the class.”
- State of California, et al., On The Go Wireless, LLC, v. Cellco Partnership, et al. Served as trial counsel representing the largest political subdivisions in the largest state in the nation—including the University of California system, the California State University System, and the County of Los Angeles, to name a few—in this groundbreaking suit against Verizon, AT&T, and Sprint for over-billing the government. Nath helped secure settlements with all defendants collectively valued at $175 million, which have been paid to hundreds of California and Nevada government entities. These record-setting settlements are the largest of their kind in California.
- Rui Zhi Ventures, Ltd. v. Lighting Science Group Corporation (C.D. Cal. and JAMS Arbitration) Represented Lighting Science Group Corporation in a fee dispute with its former patent broker. After successfully compelling arbitration, the parties reached a confidential settlement on the eve of the plenary arbitration hearing.
- Bernstein, et al. v. Cengage Learning, Inc. (S.D.N.Y.) Represented authors of higher education textbooks for failure to pay royalties owed on their contracts when those texts were offered on the company’s online platforms. Secured a non-reversionary settlement of $21 million approved by the court for past damages.
- Bartz et al. v. Anthropic PBC (N.D. Cal) Secured a $1.5 billion settlement in a “historic” deal for rightsholders whose books were downloaded by Anthropic from the pirated databases “Library Genesis” and “Pirate Library Mirror.” This settlement is the largest publicly reported recovery in the history of U.S. copyright litigation. When preliminarily approving the settlement, Judge Alsup said, “We have some of the best lawyers in America in the courtroom right now.” Read more in Bloomberg and Law.com.
- In Re OpenAI Inc. Copyright Infringement Litigation (S.D.N.Y.) Represents a putative classes of book authors bringing copyright infringement claims against OpenAI and Microsoft. Class plaintiffs are best-selling authors who allege their books were illegally pirated and used to develop OpenAI and Microsoft’s Large Language Models, including the models used in ChatGPT.
- Flo & Eddie Inc. v. Pandora (C.D. Cal.) Served as co-lead counsel representing Flo & Eddie (the founding members of 70’s music group, The Turtles) in a putative class action alleging infringement of the public performance right in sound recordings, copying, and misappropriation. This case followed the similar, Flo & Eddie v. Sirius XM, in which Susman Godfrey secured a settlement for the class valued at up to $73 million. The Court granted final approval of that settlement in 2017.
- Personalized Media Communications, LLC Cases (E.D. Tex.) Represented Personalized Media Communications (PMC) in a series of patent infringement cases against Vizio, Samsung, and Funai. Nath played a key role in these cases, which included taking and defending key depositions and briefing claim construction motions. PMC reached favorable, confidential settlements with each defendant.
Honors & Distinctions
Honors and Awards
- Litigator of the Week, Law.com (2025)
- Top Intellectual Property Lawyer, The Daily Journal (2025)
- Lawdragon 500X - The Next Generation of Leading Lawyers (2023, 2024, 2025)
- “They’ve Got Next: The 40 Under 40” Bloomberg Law (Bloomberg, 2023)
- California Lawyer Attorney of the Year, Daily Journal (2023)
- Rising Stars of the Plaintiffs Bar, National Law Journal’s Elite Trial Lawyers (2022, ALM)
- Public Counsel Pro Bono Award (2020)
- Named a Sports and Entertainment Litigation Trailblazer by National Law Journal (2020, ALM)
- Rising Star, Southern California (2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025 Thomson Reuters)
- Editor-in-Chief, The University of Chicago Law Review
- Order of the Coif
- Kirkland & Ellis Scholar: Awarded to top 5 percent of the 1L class
- 2011 Teacher of Today Award
- Wake Forest University Debate Team
Clerkships
- Honorable Alex Kozinski, United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
Education
Education
- The University of Chicago Law School (J.D., with High Honors, Order of the Coif, 2014)
- Editor-in-Chief, The University of Chicago Law Review
- Wake Forest University (B.A., magna cum laude, 2009)
Publications
- "Poisoning the WeLL(M): Pirated Data, Large Language Models, and Copyright," The Advocate, Texas State Bar Litigation Section, Winter 2024 Edition
- Corruption Clarified: Defining the Reach of “Agent” in 18 U.S.C. § 666, 80 U. Chi. L. Rev. 1391 (2013)
