Texas-based company may benefit from patent infringement suit

A capital management firm based in Fort Worth, Texas, may benefit from a recent U.S. District Court's jury announcement stating that Marvell Technology Group Ltd. should have to pay almost $1.2 billion in damages to Carnegie Mellon University for infringing on the university's integrated-circuit technology, said a recent report. The company, which makes computer chips for cellular phones, is based in Bermuda.

The company's infringement was found to be willful which provides grounds for the U.S. District Judge in the case to triple the jury award, according to the university's intellectual property attorneys. The president of Stadtler Capital Management based out of Fort Worth holds a short position on Marvell Technology so it stands to benefit if the company's stock should fall in light of the jury's announcement.

In 2009, Carnegie Mellon University sued Marvell Technology Group over its use of two of the university's patents, which were issued in 2001 and 2002. The patents include methods in which filtering out noise or unwanted electrical signals allow stored data to be detected on a computer's hard- disk drive. The university complaint stated that a minimum of nine different types of circuits used by Marvell utilized the school's inventions.

Apparently the jury in the case tried in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania agreed with the school's claims. Marvell's last fiscal year saw almost $3 billion dollars in revenue. If the judge triples the jury's damage award, the company could be in dire straits. A company, even a research university's patents and inventions are often its lifeline to future growth and innovation and when its patents and intellectual property are infringed upon it can be critical to its survival to protect its rights to exclusive use or licensing of that technology.

Source: Bloomberg, "Marvell, Adidas, Mumford & Sons: Intellectual Property," Victoria Slind-Flor, Dec 26, 2012

Our Houston, Texas, law handles a wide range of commercial and business litigation issues, including intellectual property infringement matters similar to the one discussed in the above post.