Patent Law

Willfully

By Gary Odom and Jordan Kuhn

Australian patent-holding company QPSX Developments 5 sued Nortel, Juniper Networks, Lucent, Cisco and Alcatel in June 2005 for infringing 5,689,499, in the east Texas. All settled but Nortel. Nortel lost.

The jury awarded $28 million in damages. Nortel cried "excessive." Judge T. John Ward agreed, cutting the award to $11.82 million, "the largest amount supported by the evidence." Then Ward found Nortel willful. "Specifically, the duration of Nortel's infringement and the lack of any evidence that it attempted to avoid infringement weigh heavily in favor of enhanced damages." So Ward tacked a 1.7 multiplier on, topping the tab to $20 million.

Full post as published by The Patent Prospector on March 20, 2008 (boomark / email).