Apple Inc. and LG Electronics Inc. did not infringe an Alcatel-Lucent SA unit’s patents for electronic devices including phones and computers, a jury said.
The verdict Thursday came after a trial that began Nov. 27 in federal court in San Diego over a 2010 lawsuit by the Paris- based company’s Multimedia Patent Trust accusing Apple and LG Electronics of copying video-compression technology that allows data to be sent more efficiently over communications media, including the Internet and satellites, or stored on DVDs and Blu-Ray disks.
The trust claimed its patents were infringed by products including multiple versions of Apple’s iPhone, iPod, iPad and MacBook, as well as LG Electronics’ Chocolate Touch VX8575, Bliss UX700, Touch AX8575, Lotus Elite LX610, Mystique UN610 and Samba LG8575.
Alcatel-Lucent’s attorney, Frederick Lorig, asked jurors to award $172.3 million in royalty damages from Apple and $9.1 million from LG Electronics. Apple was accused of infringing three Alcatel-Lucent patents and LG Electronics was alleged to have infringed two of the patents.
Attorneys for Apple and LG Electronics told jurors that their companies had already paid the Multimedia Patent Trust for the technology covered by the patents from an industrywide “pay-as-you-go” pool.
They said the trust is trying to broaden the scope of its intellectual property to cover new electronic advances in the allegedly infringing products based on technology that supersedes the patents.
Lorig declined to comment on the verdict as did Michael McKeon, an attorney for LG Electronics.
“We are very pleased with the verdict,” said Apple’s attorney, Juanita Brooks. Kristin Huguet, a spokeswoman for Apple, declined to comment.
Apple Thursday lost an infringement case brought by patent- licensing firm MobileMedia Ideas LLC when a federal jury in Delaware decided the iPhone maker misappropriated protected technology for the handheld devices. The panel found infringement of three patents. The judge has not yet scheduled a trial on damages.
