Case Filed: Oct 10, 2013
Case Closed: Apr 16, 2014
Court: Delaware District Court
Judge: Leonard P. Stark
Case Summary:
Pragmatus, a licensing company
based in Alexandria, Virginia, asserted two US patents on mobile devices that
can be tracked by GPS signals. The case was filed against Chinese phone maker
ZTE Corporation. The patents in the suit included US8149124 and US8466795 both
reading ‘Personal security and tracking system’ issued duly by USPTO on Apr 12,
2012 and Jun 18, 2013, respectively. The patents are set to expire[i]
by Jan 21, 2017 and are currently assigned[ii]
to Pragmatus (source: MaxVal’s Assignment
Database).
The '124 patent describes a
method for tracking a mobile device through GPS signals, while the '795 patent
discloses a cellular device used in housing components including a speaker,
microphone or battery.
The complaint stated that ZTE
directly infringed the patents by making, using, offering for sale, selling
and/or practicing the inventions covered by the claims of the '124 and ‘795
patents by providing the ZTE Z992 smartphone and indirectly infringed by
encouraging or aiding third parties (e.g., ZTE' s users) to use the ZTE Z992
smartphone in a way that infringes the '124 and ‘795 patents.
According to the complaint,
Pragmatus had provided ZTE, a written notice of infringement prior to the
filing of this suit, thus stating the infringement was willful. Pragmatus
demanded damages adequate to compensate Pragmatus for ZTE’s infringement
including prejudgment and post-judgment interest, costs, disbursements and
enhanced damages, as a result of willful infringement.
The proceeding came to end when
defendant filed a motion to dismiss the case for lack of standing. The court
agreed to grant the motion as the plaintiff did not file an opposition. The
court, thereby ordered the case dismissed without prejudice.
See 1:13-cv-01684
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[i]
Expected expiration date. Patent Term Estimator is a free web-based tool that
automatically calculates patent terms and expiration dates for U.S. utility
patents
[ii]
MaxVal offers Patent Assignment Alert service where subscribers receive email
alerts when assignments relating to target applications, patents or entities of
interest are recorded.
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