Spherix accuses Cisco of “immense” patent infringement
IP development company Spherix Incorporated has filed a lawsuit against technology company Cisco Systems asserting a series of patents in a lucrative portfolio it acquired last year.
In the lawsuit, Spherix claims California-based Cisco has committed “immense infringement” through its products, which include switches and routers.
Delaware-based Spherix announced last year that it had secured a suite of patents from a portfolio owned by non-practising entity Rockstar Consortium, which is owned jointly by Apple, Microsoft, RIM, Ericsson and Sony.
Rockstar was established in 2011, when the company bought the same portfolio from defunct telecommunications company Nortel Networks for an undisclosed fee.
The lawsuit, filed at the US District Court for the District of Delaware on March 24, is asserting 11 patents that it says are all derived from the portfolio.
“All of the inventions disclosed and claimed in the asserted patents were conceived and created by inventors that were working for an entity within or related to the Nortel corporate family at the time of the invention,” Spherix said in its complaint.
Spherix said it now owns the patents and has the “exclusive right” to sue for infringement and recover damages for “past, present, and future” infringement.
The complaint cited several Cisco products, including the GSR12000 Series service-provider routers and the Nexus line of data-centre switches, as allegedly infringing products.
“The scope of Cisco’s infringement of the asserted patents has been and continues to be immense.
“The vast majority of Cisco’s switching and routing revenue from March 2008 until the present is and has been generated by products and services implementing technology that infringes the asserted patents,” Spherix’s complaint added.
Spherix, which is being represented by law-firm Cozen O’Connor, is seeking enhanced damages, claiming deliberate infringement and a ruling that Cisco has infringed all 11 patents.
Neither Spherix nor Cisco responded immediately to requests for comment.
