TiVo sues EchoStar. EchoStar retaliates by suing TiVo. Fast forward a year or so… EchoStar’s suit is stayed, pending analysis by the United States Patent and Trademark Office.
ALVISO, Calif., Aug 28, 2006 /PRNewswire-FirstCall via COMTEX News Network/ — TiVo Inc. (Nasdaq: TIVO), the creator of and the leader in television services for digital video recorders (DVR), today offered the following statement on the court stay of EchoStar Technology Corporation’s lawsuit against TiVo and Humax USA. On July 14, 2006, United States Magistrate Judge Caroline M. Craven for the United States District Court, Eastern District of Texas, issued a stay order, which is now final.
“We are pleased with the Court’s order to stay EchoStar Technology Corporation’s patent infringement litigation pending the outcome of the USPTO reexamination proceedings of certain EchoStar patents. The reexamination requests TiVo submitted to the USPTO detail how a large number of prior art references that the USPTO did not previously consider raise substantial new questions regarding the validity of the claims EchoStar asserted and why those claims are invalid. TiVo will continue to defend its technology vigorously and will not be intimidated by claims such as those EchoStar asserted against TiVo — claims EchoStar asserted in response to TiVo’s successful suit against EchoStar. As the jury found on April 13, 2006 in TiVo’s suit against EchoStar, EchoStar willfully infringed TiVo’s pioneering time warping patent. TiVo will continue to vigorously pursue its rights in that case.”
The order grants a stay in the proceedings in EchoStar Technology Corporation’s lawsuit against TiVo and Humax USA, Inc. regarding the alleged infringement of U.S. Patent Nos. 5,774,186 (“Interruption Tolerant Video Program Viewing”), 6,208,804 B1 (“Multimedia Direct Access Storage Device and Formatting Method”), and 6,529,685 B2 (“Multimedia Direct Access Storage Device and Formatting Method”) pending the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) completion of proceedings with respect to TiVo’s request for reexamination of those patents.