Patent firm awarded $1.5M in infringement dispute with insurer

A jury in a federal district court in Texas has awarded a patent firm $1.5 million in a dispute with an Old Republic International Corp. unit in a patent infringement case.

The Tyler, Texas, jury on Wednesday decided in favor of Bellevue, Washington-based Intellectual Ventures II LLC, which buys, licenses and develops patents, in its dispute with Old Republic unit Sioux City, Nebraska-based Great West Casualty Co. in Intellectual Ventures II LLC v. Great West Casualty Co.

According to the January 2015 complaint in the case, Great West infringed one of Intellectual Ventures’ patents in connection with its online services and other systems. 

The patent Apparatus for Distributing Content Objects to a personalized Access Point of a User Over Network-based Environment and Method was issued to Intellectual Ventures by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office in April 2009, according to the complaint.

Attorneys in the case could not immediately be reached for comment.

Taiwan's Foxconn Technology Co. Ltd. on Tuesday responded to a patent infringement lawsuit filed against it by Microsoft Corp., saying as a contract manufacturer, it has never needed to pay royalties for the U.S. company's software.