A Nebraska jury has ordered Sprint to pay $30 million to Prism Technologies, a patent-holding company that has sued the five largest cell phone carriers.
Tuesday's verdict (PDF) comes at a time when Congress is debating, for the second time in recent years, a bill to rein in companies like Prism, often referred to as "patent trolls."
Prism Technologies was founded as a successor to Prism Resources, an operating company that existed from 1991 to 2001 according to an online biography of co-founder Richard Gregg, who testified at trial. The company is now focused solely on licensing and litigation, and it has continued to get more patents.
The jury found that Sprint violated US Patents No. 8,127,345 and 8,387,155, both of which describe methods of "managing access to protected computer resources." According to the complaint (PDF), filed in 2012, Sprint's Simply Everything Plan and Everything Data Plan are both methods of "controlling access to Sprint’s protected network resources," and thus infringe the patents. The complaint asked for damages and an injunction that would actually stop Sprint from selling the plans—something that patent trolls like Prism can't really get anymore.
Sprint isn't Prism's only target. The patent troll has big ambitions, having used this patent group to sue all of the five largest US cell phone carriers. It has pending litigation in Nebraska against T-Mobile, Verizon, and US Cellular. Court records indicate Prism's case against AT&T also went to a jury trial, but it was settled before the jury reached a verdict.
Prism has used strategies that only the best-funded patent trolls can partake in, such as suing Blackberry (then RIM) at the International Trade Commission in 2009. RIM ultimately settled with Prism. On its website, Prism claims it has over 30 licensees, including Microsoft, VeriSign, Adobe, National Instruments, Bank of America, Harris Bancorp, among others. Nebraska litigation rules require limited liability companies like Prism to list all their members when they file suit. So Prism's corporate disclosure (PDF) lists the original company as Prism Resources, as well as over 50 other people and entities, mostly residents of Nevada and Nebraska.
Neither Prism's chief legal officer nor the company's outside counsel responded to requests for comment about the verdict against Sprint.
The Prism verdict is the second of two verdicts favoring patent-holding companies in recent days. Last week, a Texas jury ordered Chinese cell phone company ZTE to pay $31.5 million to a company called DataQuill.
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