Apple today ordered a federal court in Texas to pay $ 502.6 million to a patent legend called VirnetX, the latest twist in an eight-year legal battle over FaceTime and iMessage patents, according to Bloomberg ]
Apple and VirnetX have been fighting in court since 2010, when the company that owns the patent said that the iPhone manufacturer violated four of its patents related to Internet-based communications. The legal battle has been protracted and involves multiple demands and a dizzying number of appeals. The last thing we knew about the fight was in October 2017, when Apple was ordered to pay $ 439.7 million, a ruling that the company then appealed.
VirnetX is a patent assertion entity, which means that its entire business model rests solely on claims from companies that actually develop and sell products based on patent infringement laws and flexible interpretations of property regulations intellectual. VirnetX is headquartered in Zephyr Cove, Nevada, and filed its lawsuit in East Texas, a district where patent holders are most likely to succeed in intellectual property cases until the Supreme Court suppressed the practice last year.
VirnetX, in a filing with the SEC, described its approach to making money by saying that its "intellectual property portfolio is the basis of our business model." The company's stock rose 44 percent today with news of the federal ruling in its favor, Bloomberg says. However, the failure can eventually be canceled. The US Court of Appeals UU For the Federal Circuit in Washington, it is reviewing cases in which the Board of Appeals and Patent Appeals alleges that the patents in question are in fact invalid.