X Corp sues Adeia to block US patent infringement claims (updated)

Adeia

29/11/2023 18:00

(Adds response from Adeia in paragraph 4, updates headline)
    By Blake Brittain
       Nov 29 (Reuters) - Elon Musk's X Corp has sued TiVo
technology owner Adeia Inc  ADEA.O  in California federal court,
seeking a declaration that the social-media company does not
infringe Adeia's digital-media patents.
    X said in the Tuesday complaint that it was suing to head
off an expected Adeia patent-infringement lawsuit following the
breakdown of a licensing agreement between the companies.
    Adeia was the intellectual-property licensing unit of TiVo
owner Xperi  XPER.N  before being spun off into an independent
company last year.
    "Our position is that this lawsuit is without merit," an
Adeia spokesperson said on Wednesday.
        Representatives for X did not immediately respond to a
request for comment on Wednesday. 
  
    According to the complaint, TiVo agreed to license its
patents to X, then known as Twitter, in 2019. The lawsuit said
that Adeia sued X in California state court this August for
allegedly breaking their contract. 
    X said that Adeia's complaint improperly revealed
confidential terms of the agreement, including that X pays a
licensing fee of $3 million per year. It told Adeia on Tuesday
that it was terminating their contract based on the disclosure.
    X's lawsuit on Tuesday said that it faced an imminent risk
of being sued by Adeia for patent infringement based in part on
what it called a recent plan by Adeia to "target social media
companies" with its licensing efforts.
    Adeia's website says that its patents "broadly cover all
aspects of the entertainment experience, including guidance,
discovery, search, recommendations, DVR, VOD, OTT, multi-screen,
personalization, data analytics, advertising, imaging, content
storage and high-performance computing."
    X said that Adeia's patents do not cover any of its
services. It asked the court to find that it specifically does
not infringe four Adeia patents related to content
recommendations, digital advertising, social-media integration
and other technology.
    
    The case is X Corp v. Adeia Inc, U.S. District Court for the
Northern District of California, No. 3:23-cv-06151.
    For X: David Silbert and Sharif Jacob of Keker Van Nest &
Peters
    For Adeia: attorney information not yet available

 (Reporting by Blake Brittain in Washington)
 ((blake.brittain@tr.com; +1 (202) 938-5713;))