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Appeared on: Wednesday, January 22, 2014
Jury Finds Google Infringed SimpleAir Patent

Google infringed a patent held by SimpleAir, a jury found, with the search giant now facing an $125 million damages claim.

The verdict was reached on Saturday, January 18, 2014, following a week-long trial presided over by the Honorable Rodney Gilstrap, U.S. District Judge for the Eastern District of Texas.

SimpleAir had alleged that Google's push notification services for the Android smartphones and tablets infringed five claims of the 7,035,914 patent. The jury agreed unanimously on all counts of infringement and also found unanimously that each claim was valid. The validity of the patent had previously been confirmed by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office during a Reexamination proceeding that concluded in February 2013.

The accused services are the Google Cloud Messaging (GCM) and Android Cloud to Device Messaging (C2DM) services. The services are used by Google to process and send instant notifications for Android applications, such as Facebook, Twitter, and Gmail.

The jury was unable to reach a unanimous decision on the amount of damages to award for Google's infringement. The damages issue will be decided by a separate jury in a limited second trial. SimpleAir will seek damages in excess of $125 million for Google's infringement in the damages retrial.

SimpleAir describes itself as an inventor-owned technology licensing company. Its patent portfolio is licensed by several technology companies, including Apple.

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