District Court Rules For Netflix in Patent Infringement Fight Against Rovi

U.S. District Judge Phyllis Hamilton in Oakland, California issued a declaratory judgment Wednesday in favor of Netflix, stating the Rovi patents involved in Netflix's litigation against Rovi are invalid, making Rovi's patent infringement claims against Netflix "moot." The complaint for declaratory relief, first filed by Netflix in December 2011, was in response to Rovi's attempts to license five of its patents to Netflix that Rovi said the streaming video service was infringing upon, the complaint submission said. Netflix also claimed the patents Rovi said were being infringed upon were too broad, making them invalid. The court issued a claim construction ruling as well, for the nine disputed claim terms in the case, siding with Rovi in most. "While we are pleased that the court sided with Rovi on the key claim construction issues, we are disappointed in, and strongly disagree with, the Court’s decision finding the five patents invalid and plan to appeal that decision," said Samir Armaly, Rovi executive vice president-intellectual property and licensing, in a written statement Thursday. "We are committed to enforcing our intellectual property against Netflix until the necessary licenses are in place." "We are gratified by the Court’s judgment, which confirmed that Rovi’s patents are so broad and abstract as to be invalid," a Netflix spokesperson said.