‘Egregious Willful Infringement’
A United States District Court Judge ruled that Samsung Electronics had to pay US$21 million (23.41 billion won) for infringing two digital photography patents.
According to foreign press reports on August 26, the U.S. District Court in the Eastern District of Texas hammered Samsung Electronics with US$21 million (23.41 billion won) in enhanced damages, tripling a US$7 million (7.8 billion won) award that a jury had leveled against Samsung Electronics earlier against Imperium IP Holdings for “egregious” willful infringement.
The court said that expert witnesses by Samsung made multiple material misrepresentations under oath and presented false testimony to the jury, regarding important questions to determine intentionality like whether Samsung Electronics traced the patents of Imperium and was aware of the patents before the lawsuit.
Imperium filed a suit against Samsung earlier in the U.S. District Court for Eastern Texas, saying that the Korean firm’s smartphone and tablet PC cameras had violated three patents, including one for digital camera image sensors.