Western Digital must pay $315.7 million in patent infringement lawsuit

Late this week, a federal court in California found Western Digital guilty of infringing SPEX’s intellectual property rights through a patent covering data encryption technology. The first of the companies uses these technologies in its Ultrastar, My Book and My Passport series hard drives.

Image source: Western Digital

California-based SPEX Technology bought the disputed patent from crypto company Spyrus before suing Western Digital in 2016, Reuters reported. It is noteworthy that one of the founders of Spyrus, Sue Pontius, said that she was grateful to the court for the verdict. SPEX representatives emphasized that such a court decision is the best proof that Pontius was right and the result of her perseverance.

Western Digital denies that SPEX has violated its intellectual property rights, stating its intentions to take measures to protect its interests, including appealing this court decision. In July, the same California court in Santa Ana found Western Digital guilty of violating the intellectual property rights of another company, imposing a fine of more than $262 million. Then we were talking about technologies related to increasing the capacity of hard drives.