Arista and Cisco settle long-running patent dispute
Arista Networks and Cisco Systems announced yesterday that they have reached a settlement in their long-running patent dispute with Arista paying Cisco $400 million.
In a regulatory filing filed yesterday, August 6 at the US Securities and Exchange Commission, Arista said that the agreement will end all pending district court and US International Trade Commission (ITC) litigation between the parties.
In return for a $400 million payment, technology company Cisco will drop patent infringement claims it made against computer networking company Arista, while Arista will drop antitrust claims it made against Cisco.
In addition, the companies have agreed that they will not bring new patent or copyright infringement litigation against one another regarding existing products for five years (with limited exceptions).
The parties will instead use an arbitration process to address any patent issues regarding new products.
The dispute dates back to 2014, when Cisco filed a patent and copyright infringement claim against Arista at the US District Court for the Northern District of California.
Mark Chandler, executive vice president and chief legal officer at Cisco, said in a blog that the agreement demonstrates the parties’ commitment to the “principles of IP protection”.
“As part of this agreement, Arista will be making a $400 million payment to Cisco, is committed to maintaining the product modifications it made as a result of previous rulings, and will be making limited changes to further differentiate its user interfaces from Cisco’s.”
Chandler added that Arista and Cisco will continue to seek appellate court review of a verdict in an earlier trial regarding legal protection for user interfaces.
In one development in the case, in April 2017, the US Customs and Border Protection ruled that Arista’s redesigned products do not infringe Cisco’s patents: US numbers 7,200,145; 6,741,592; and 7,162,537.
This allowed Arista to continue importing the products into the US.
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