USA Video Technology sued Cable Companies over Video-on-demand patent

USA Video Technology Corporation has recently filed a patent infringement lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas against several large cable companies including Time Warner, Cox Communications, Charter Communications and Comcast for infringing its U.S. Patent No. 5,130,792 (the ‘792 patent) and seeking fair compensation and a court injunction against further infringement. The ‘792 patent titled “Store and Forward Video System” covers a pioneering breakthrough system and method for providing video-on-demand (VOD) service. Earlier, in April 2003 USA Video Technology sued Movielink for patent infringement in the U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware alleging that Movielink was willfully infringing the ‘792 patent and sought declaratory judgment for both infringement and willful infringement, permanent injunctive relief, compensatory and treble damages. However, on January 28, 2005 District court ruled in the favor of Movielink stating that Movielink is not willfully infringing the ‘729 patent and thereby granting Movielink’s motion for summary judgment of non-infringement. Following unfavorable verdict, USA Video Technology further filed an appeal with the Federal Circuit of Appeals which later in June 2006 upheld the district court ruling that Movielink is not infringing the ‘729 patent. The ‘729 patent is directed to a system and method for transferring a video program for display at a remote location. The application for the ‘729 patent was filed in February 1990 assigned to USA Video Inc. Since, issuance of the ‘729 patent in July 1992, the ‘729 patent seems to be pioneering with about 200 forward US patent citations. Relevant Cases --- USA Video Technology Corporation v. Movielink LLC (Judge Kent A. Jordan, District Court for the District of Delaware, decided on January 2005) USA Video Technology Corporation v. Movielink LLC (Judge Paul Michel, S. Jay Plager and William Curtis Bryson, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, decided on June 2006)