TiVo Wins DVR Patent Ruling Against EchoStar

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on January 31, 2008 - 11:48am.

Alviso, Calif. - TiVo (NASD: TIVO) said on Thursday that the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has upheld its claim that rival EchoStar (NASD: DISH), operator of the DISH Network satellite TV service, was infringing on one of its digital video recorder patents, and must pay $74 million in damages, now $94 million with accrued interest.

"We are extremely pleased that the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit unanimously ruled in our favor in EchoStar's appeal of the district court judgment of patent infringement, full award of damages and that the injunction, which was stayed pending appeal, was ordered to be reinstated," the company said in a statement.

For its part, EchoStar said that the ruling will have no effect on its customers, as the company has already deployed next-generation digital video recorder software that does not infringe TiVo's patents.

The company also plans to appeal the $94 million jury verdict.

News of the ruling sent shares of TiVo up over 30% to a 53-week high in trading on Thursday.