A federal court Friday ruled in favor of Sprint in a VoIP patent lawsuit against Time Warner Cable (now part of Charter Communications), several news outlets have reported. Charter will be required to pay Sprint at least $139.8 million and possibly triple that amount. The Sprint VoIP patent lawsuit dates back to 2011. The decision was made by the U.S. District Court for the District of Kansas.
Sprint has a similar suit against Comcast that is scheduled to begin this week before the same judge, Bloomberg reports.
Sprint VoIP Patent Lawsuit
Friday’s decision could not yet be found on the U.S. District Court for District of Kansas website. But according to local media outlet Kansas City Star, Sprint’s lawsuit cited discoveries by an employee that led to a “sea change in telephony.” A previous Sprint VoIP patent lawsuit garnered the company $80 million from Vonage in a 2007 settlement and an undisclosed amount from Paetec in 2009.
According to Ars Technica, Sprint’s 2011 actions included filing suits against several other cable companies as well as Time Warner Cable and Comcast. The suits stated that the companies violated 12 different Sprint VoIP patents. Comcast has filed a counter-suit against Sprint, Ars Technica said.
A Charter spokesperson told Bloomberg Friday that the company was considering its options, which suggests that the company could file an appeal in Friday’s ruling.
