Google Ordered To Pay $338.7m Over Chromecast Patents

A Texas court has ordered Google to pay $338.7 million (£264m) to Touchstream Technologies over what it said were infringed patents in Google’s Chromecast service for streaming video from one device to another.

Touchstream claims its founder, David Strober, a former e-learning instructional systems designer at SUNY Westchester Community College, in 2010 a means for video to be transmitted from a smaller device, such as a smartphone, to a larger one such as a television set.

In its 2021 lawsuit the firm claimed it met with Google in December 2011 over a potential partnership but was told two months later that the tech giant wasn’t interested in its technology.

Google went on to launch its own Chromecast technology in 2013.

Patent challenge

New York City-based Touchstream said Google copied its inventions and infringed three of its patents, US Patent Nos. 8,356,251; 8,782,528; and 8,904,289.

The firm claimed its patents are also infringed by Google’s Home and Nest smart devices and third-party televisions and speakers that include Chromecast features.

A federal jury at the Western District of Texas’s Waco division unanimously agreed with Touchstream’s arguments.

Google had previously challenged the validity of the three patents in inter partes reviews at the US Patent Trial and Appeal Board, arguing they were based on obvious previous inventions, and the board is expected to deliver a final decision on their validity in September or October.

Appeal pending

Touchstream said it was satisfied with the verdict, while Google said it plans to appeal.

The search firm said in a statement that it has “always developed technology independently and competed on the merits of our ideas”.

Touchstream earlier this year filed similar patent-infringement claims against cable firms Comcast, Charter and Altice in Texas. Those cases are still pending.