Google Chromecast infringes three patents of Touchstream Technologies, Inc. and must pay $338.7 million in damages, a judge in the Western District of Texas decided on Friday, as reported. Law360.
Judgment [PDF] shows the jury upholding Touchstream’s claims that Google infringed the patents 8,356,251, 8,782,528and 8,904,289 (Touchstream Technologies Inc. v. Google LLC, case number 6:21-cv-00569 in the US District Court for the Western District of Texas).
The decision comes after Touchstream filed a complaint in June 2021 saying that it met with Google in December 2011 and was told that the technology giant was not interested in partnering with it in February 2012. Google then released Chromecast in 2013. The complaint refers to the first and second and third generations of Chromecast, Chromecast Ultra- Chromecast Ultra- Chromecast Ultra- Chromecast and other Chromecast products of Google Touch and others. tents.
The complaint states that Touchstream founder David Strober “since mid-2010” saw the need to move videos viewed on small screens, such as mobile screens, to a large screen, such as a TV or monitor. Strober eventually wanted to use a device, like a cell phone, “to make video play on a second screen, even if the video is somewhere else (such as the public Internet),” the complaint says, adding that Stober had a “working mark” in late 2010 with his first patent application filed in April 2011.
All three of Touchstream’s proposed patents are called “Play controls on a display device” and detail “a system for displaying and controlling content on a display device” that uses “a network, a server machine integrated with the network and consisting of one or more servers, a display device integrated with the network and having a display, and a computer device that serves to send system information over the Internet according to the specified network.”
The patent documents continue: “The server system maintains communication between the personal computing device and the display device. The first message identifies the user’s selection of the video player to play the content. The server system is operable, in response to receiving the first message from the personal computer, to provide to the display device a second message identifying the user’s selection and the media player required to display the content in the second channel to play the content, download the video player and display the content. it’s on display.”
Google has denied infringing Touchstream’s patents and said the patents are invalid, based on the principle of obviouswhich argues that inventions that are visible to the public because of prior inventions cannot be copyrighted.
In court, Google says the proposed patents are “vague and do not cover all the ways to select content on your device and view it on another screen,” as Law360 reported.
Google also said that Chromecast differs from Touchstream technologies because Chromecast uses a server machine and a display device, while Touchstream’s patents describe in detail the organizations of the server and the display.
Google has also said that Touchstream is a legal entity with no sales or customer base and has therefore asked the court to block Chromecast sales. Touchstream’s “only business is trying to make legitimate money. If Touchstream receives damages, it will have served its sole business purpose,” Google said, as reported by Law360.
Google declined to comment further on what the rule means for Chromecast products to Ars Technica.
Google to appeal
In a statement to Ars, Google spokesman José Castañeda said:
We strongly disagree with this decision and will appeal. We have always developed our own technology and competed on the merits of our ideas, and we will continue to defend ourselves against these false claims.
Google is challenging the validity of three Touchstream patents at the Patent Trial and Appeal Board, with rulings expected by October, Law360 reported.
Ars reached out to Touchstream’s lawyers at Shook, Hardy & Bacon LLP about the lawsuit and Google’s claims that Touchstream is only interested in patents. Ryan Dykal, an IP partner working on the case, said:
Touchstream filed for patent protection and spent a year developing its technology before meeting with Google under an NDA. The trial history shows that even though it was protected by NDA and patent documents, just a few weeks after their meeting Google started to make it in secret. [its] breaking the casting technique. After Google flooded the market with 140 million infringing devices – which are often sold or cheap – Touchstream continued to build its business until it was forced to enforce its rights from 2017. The court was presented with all the facts and confirmed that Touchstream’s patents are valid and Google violated them.
Google declined to comment on Touchstream’s claims.
Touchstream also has patent infringement lawsuits against Altice, Charter, and Comcast, Law360 noted. Touchstream claims that the company’s software and/or advanced technologies infringe on similar patents, including the aforementioned patent 8,356,251 that Touchstream accused Google of infringing.