A U.S. district court has ordered chip maker Marvell Technology to pay Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) $1.54 billion for infringing on two hard drive chip patents.
The decision by U.S. District Judge Nora Barry Fischer in Pennsylvania ends for now a five-year legal battle between the two. The lawsuit was originally filed in 2009. In 2012, a jury found Marvell had violated CMU's patents, and the chip maker then appealed that ruling.
The case involves chip technology that "significantly improves" the ability of drives to more accurately detect data stored on spinning disk platters. CMU originally applied for the patents in 1997.
The court awarded CMU a total of $1.54 billion, which includes the jury's verdict of $1.17 billion, along with supplemental damages of $79.5 million and $287 million in punitive damages for willful infringement.
Marvell was also ordered to pay interest at 0.14% annually, and 50 cents for each infringing chip it sells in the future.
"We understand that Marvell intends to appeal, and we look forward to the Federal Circuit vindicating Carnegie Mellon University's intellectual property rights just as Judge Fischer did," K&L Gates, the law firm representing CMU, stated in an email response to a Computerworld request for comment.
Marvell could be reached for comment on the decision.
Lucas Mearian covers consumer data storage, consumerization of IT, mobile device management, renewable energy, telematics/car tech and entertainment tech for Computerworld. Follow Lucas on Twitter at @lucasmearian or subscribe to Lucas's RSS feed . His e-mail address is lmearian@computerworld.com.
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