Patent litigations and settlements around 17 Sept 07

AT&T was ordered to pay $156 million after losing a jury verdict in a patent infringement case brought by TGIP Inc. over technology related to activated calling cards, which case was tried in the Beaumont division of the infamous United States District Court for the Eastern District of Texas. [The case had been brought against the old AT&T, prior to the SBC merger. Due diligence? See Reuters.]

SEPARATELY, TruePosition (Berwyn, PA, of LibertyMedia of Englewood, Colo) prevailed in a patent infringement suit against Andrew Corp. in D. Delaware, winning 45.3 million in damages concerning a patent directed to a method of locating wireless phones.
[Philly BizJournal]

MEANWHILE, Angiotech Pharmaceuticals, Inc. , announced on 17 Sept 07 that it reached a favorable agreement [settlement] with Johnson & Johnson's subsidiary, Conor Medsystems ["Conor"] to settle all outstanding patent litigation with respect to Conor's CoStar(R) paclitaxel [TAXOL] stent. [See CNN Money

ADDITIONALLY, Cree and Nichia reached an agreement which covers some of Cree's technology related to white light-emitting diodes as well as the company's nitride lasers, used primarily in colored LEDs. [see bizjournals]