The smart speaker segment is crowded with excellent options, ranging from the low end to the higher side of the pricing spectrum. Over the years, despite juggernauts like Amazon and Google launching their own smart home speakers, California-based Sonos has stood firm with quality offerings like the Era 300. In 2020, the company sued Google over alleged patent and copyright infringement.
Well, a jury in a San Francisco federal court has recently ruled in favor of Sonos, compelling Google to pay $2.30 for each infringing unit (~14.1 million units), totaling $32.5 million. Sonos’ original 2020 lawsuit alleged that Google replicated the former’s multiroom audio technology when the two were working together back in 2013.
Then in January last year, the US International Trade Commission placed a limited trade ban on some of Google’s products, leading the company to specify the changes coming to its smart speakers, especially pertaining to Speaker Group. This meant that users had to individually change the volume of each speaker manually rather than control the volumes of multiple speakers collectively through the group volume controller.
Six months later, we learned that some Pixel phones may also be unable to connect to older Nest/Google Home devices, with Google placing the blame squarely on “an interruption caused by Sonos.” Fast forward to August 2022, when Google filed two new lawsuits against Sonos (in addition to the June 2020 countersuit), with one of them alleging the latter of copying Google’s wireless charging and low-power voice control tech on Sonos speakers.
In a statement to The Verge, Google spokesperson Peter Schottenfels deemed this latest ruling “a narrow dispute about some very specific features that are not commonly used,” adding that the company is looking into the “next steps.”
Meanwhile, Sonos was understandably chipper in their response, with the CFO and chief legal officer, Eddie Lazarus, telling the publication that the jury’s verdict makes it clear that “Google is a serial infringer” of their IP, going on to accuse the search giant of infringing on “more than 200 Sonos patents.”
But as Law360 notes, it wasn’t all bad news for Google, with the jury finding that the Google Home app didn’t violate another Sonos patent. US District Judge William Alsup had previously asked the jury to ignore a damage estimate of $90 million provided by an expert witness representing Sonos, claiming “some of the evidence provided was inadmissible.”
Judge Alsup blamed both Google and Sonos for taking this through the lengthy ordeal of a trial and not settling out of court, calling the situation “emblematic of the worst of patent litigation.” Nevertheless, this is a much-needed win for Sonos, especially in the wake of its slashed revenue forecast, leading to a significant dip in its market valuation, per a recent Reuters report.
