Federal Circuit Upholds JMOL of Noninfringement for DISH in ClearPlay Patent Dispute

ClearPlay owns two patents directed to methods for filtering multimedia content using discrete navigation objects. Each navigation object carries information defining a start position, a stop position, and a specific filtering action. ClearPlay sued DISH and EchoStar in the District of Utah alleging infringement based on DISH’s AutoHop commercial-skipping feature. A jury found infringement of both patents and awarded damages. The district court granted judgment as a matter of law of noninfringement, setting aside the jury’s findings. ClearPlay appealed, arguing the district court used different claim constructions than those given to the jury and applied the wrong evaluation standard. The Federal Circuit affirmed, finding no meaningful difference between the jury instructions and the JMOL order language and concluding the evidence could not sustain the infringement verdict for either patent.

"The Federal Circuit found no meaningful difference between the jury instructions and the JMOL order language for either patent."

"ClearPlay owns U.S. Patent Nos. 7,577,970 and 6,898,799 which are both directed to methods for filtering multimedia content. The patents generally describe a system in which media is divided into discrete units called "navigation objects," each of which carries information defining a start position, a stop position, and a specific filtering action."

"At trial, a jury found that AutoHop infringed both the '970 and '799 Patents and awarded damages to ClearPlay. Following the verdict, the district court granted DISH's previously filed JMOL motion, setting aside the jury's findings. ClearPlay appealed to the Federal Circuit on two grounds, arguing that the district court applied different claim constructions in the JMOL order than those given to the jury and that the court applied the wrong standard when evaluating the trial record."

"The ruling held that the trial evidence, even viewed in the light most favorable to ClearPlay, was insufficient to sustain the jury's infringement verdict on either of the asserted patents."

Read at IPWatchdog.com | Patents & Intellectual Property Law