Google Wins US Patent Trial Over Data-Retrieval Technology on Pixel Phones, Google Apps

Alphabet’s Google LLC won a jury trial on Tuesday in a long-running patent lawsuit in Delaware federal court over features in Google’s smartphones and apps.

The jury decided that Luxembourg-based patent owner Arendi SARL’s patent was invalid and that Google did not infringe it, according to the verdict made public on Wednesday.

Attorneys for Arendi did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Google spokesperson José Castañeda said the company was pleased with the decision and appreciated the jury’s “careful attention to the extensive evidence presented in this case.”

Norwegian inventor Atle Hedloy’s Arendi sued Google in 2013 over the patent, which relates to retrieving information like names and addresses from a database and entering it into word processors and spreadsheets.

Arendi alleged that Google’s mobile devices and apps including Gmail, Chrome, Docs, and Messages infringed. It asked the court for $45.5 million (roughly Rs. 37 crore) in damages, according to a spokesperson for Google’s law firm Paul Hastings.

The jury determined that Google did not infringe Arendi’s patent and agreed with Google’s argument that the patent was invalid based on earlier publications that disclosed the same invention.

Arendi has also sued other tech companies including Apple, Microsoft, and Samsung Electronics over related patents. Those cases have all been dismissed or resolved. 

© Thomson Reuters 2023