SEATTLE, Wash.-Tegic Communications Corp. scored an important victory in its patent battle with rival Zi Corp., and the result could cost Zi up to $27 million as punishment.
Following a two-week trial in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California in San Francisco, a jury ordered Zi to pay Tegic $9 million in damages, finding that Zi had willfully infringed on two of Tegic’s text input software patents.
Zi said it will appeal the ruling, and also advised investors that the ruling only affects an older version of its software, which it never sold in the United States.
Both Tegic and Zi sell software to mobile phone makers that interprets and predicts text messages typed on a mobile phone keypad, which helps users type messages more quickly. America Online Inc. acquired Tegic in 1999.
Tegic said it will now work to get the damage amount tripled, to $27 million, a move covered under the “willful infringement” of patents.
“Tegic has been an innovator in the wireless messaging space for over seven years,” the company said in a statement. “The verdict validates our intellectual property rights and represents an important milestone in protecting and enforcing Tegic’s worldwide intellectual property rights.”
In a summary judgement earlier this year, the court ruled in favor of Zi.
