A major decision after years of legal battles
Sonos and Google have been at war with each other for years now, as the former company alleges some major copyright and patent infringement. As lawsuits and accusations of theft have continued to pile up, Google has been forced to make changes to its software in response. The company was just handed its biggest blow yet, as Sonos won a major court decision that could result in an import ban on some of Google’s most popular products.
As reported by The New York Times, the US International Trade Commission handed down a victory to Sonos today, finding Google guilty of violating intellectual property from Sonos without permission. This decision comes on the heels of preliminary results released last August, in which a judge found Google to be in violation of the Tariff Act of 1930. Today’s events represent a final ruling from the USITC; the matter now heads to a presidential review for a possible veto. Assuming the Biden administration takes no action, a ban on importing infringing devices will go into effect in 60 days.
Although a complete list of affected devices has yet to be released, Sonos had initially requested the USITC block Google’s smart speakers, Pixel phones and Chromebooks, and all Chromecast models. It’s unclear whether all of these devices are still covered under this ban — after all, Google initially removed casting volume controls from Android 12 due to its legal troubles. However, the feature made its way back to phones in this week’s January patch.
The company may have been working behind the scenes to remove infringing software from other devices as well. However, as Bloomberg reports, Sonos submitted a filing on December 2nd stating that Google hasn’t implemented any changes into any actual products.
Sonos provided us with the following statement on today’s decision:
“We appreciate that the ITC has definitively validated the five Sonos patents at issue in this case and ruled unequivocally that Google infringes all five. That is an across the board win that is surpassingly rare in patent cases and underscores the strength of Sonos’s extensive patent portfolio and the hollowness of Google’s denials of copying. These Sonos patents cover Sonos’ groundbreaking invention of extremely popular home audio features, including the set up for controlling home audio systems, the synchronization of multiple speakers, the independent volume control of different speakers, and the stereo pairing of speakers. It is a possibility that Google will be able to degrade or eliminate product features in a way that circumvents the importation ban that the ITC has imposed. But while Google may sacrifice consumer experience in an attempt to circumvent this importation ban, its products will still infringe many dozens of Sonos patents, its wrongdoing will persist, and the damages owed Sonos will continue to accrue. Alternatively, Google can —as other companies have already done —pay a fair royalty for the technologies it has misappropriated.”
We’ve reached out to Google for comment and will update when we hear back.
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