How Meta awarded $174 million by court: Facebook and Instagram infringement

 

 

According to reports, a Texas court today ruled that Facebook parent company Meta infringed two patents of walkie-talkie app company Voxer, so it needs to pay the latter $174.5 million in damages.

Voxer first filed a lawsuit in the US against Meta (then the company name was Facebook) in 2020, and in 2021, the intellectual property dispute between the two companies spread to a London court. Voxer said its founder, Tom Katis, was a military veteran who became aware of the walkie-talkie's technical flaws while serving. So Katis started developing communications technology in 2006 and launched Voxer, a walkie-talkie app, in 2011.

 

　　In 2012, Facebook representatives reached out to Voxer to discuss a potential partnership. Subsequently, Voxer began disclosing its patent portfolio and know-how to Meta. When the two companies failed to reach a partnership agreement, Meta viewed Voxer as a competitor and revoked Voxer's access to key components of Facebook's platform, Voxer said in its lawsuit.

 

　　Later, Meta launched Facebook Live in 2015 and Instagram Live in 2016. For both features, Voxer said it violated its patented communication technology.

 

　　Today, a Texas court ruled in favor of Voxer, ordering Meta to pay Voxer $174.5 million in damages and rejecting Meta's attempt to ask the court to invalidate Voxer's patents.

 

　　In this regard, a Meta spokesman said: "We believe that the evidence we provided at the trial showed that Meta did not infringe Voxer's patents." The spokesman also said that Meta was prepared to appeal the ruling.

TRENDCABLE is a 21st century media that leverages data to uncover hidden insights that cut across politics, technology, social media, and the internet.

We share news from diverse languages to make news and information easily accessible for English readers.

News and information most times are written in none English text, but Trendcable has become the platform where these stories are curated and shared for your reading pleasure.

Trendcable is owned and managed by trendcable Teams, a digital media platform with a focus on dishing out news trends and trending contents that are tailored to public awareness and internet pleasures.