Unlike Apple, which walked away from trial with a record patent verdict in August 2012, Fujitsu and the company’s lawyers at Covington & Burling weathered a total loss in a patent trial against three rivals over the wireless networking cards inserted into computers for on-the-go Internet access.
After a 10-day trial, the eight-member jury sided with Belkin Inc., D-Link Corp., and NetGear Inc., deeming Fujitsu’s claims under a patent for a “card type input/output interface device” to be invalid. The jury, which began deliberating Friday, also found the defendants had not caused infringement by selling routers and access points that were compatible with wireless interface cards. Lead Belkin attorney David Enzminger of Winston & Strawn in Los Angeles told jurors a computer industry group published draft specifications for cards that would connect users to the Internet prior to Fujitsu’s first patent application in 1991. Moreover, at least one company prior to 1990 sold a wireless communication card that connected individual computers to printers and other devices through a network, he said.
