Jury awards Sprint $27.6 million in patent dispute with Comcast

A federal jury awarded Sprint $27.6 million Friday in a patent infringement lawsuit against Comcast.

The verdict came at the end of a week of trial and deliberation in U.S. District Court in Delaware. Sprint had sued in 2012, saying Comcast violated two patents Sprint had on fiber-optic SONET technology, attorney Trent Webb said.

“They found infringement on every claim we asserted … and gave us the entire amount we were asking for,” said Webb, who is head of the intellectual property group at Shook, Hardy & Bacon in Kansas City.

Comcast, which could not be reached Friday, may appeal the verdict.

Webb said SONET, or synchronous optical network, technology allows a network of fiber-optic cables to operate at a significantly larger capacity.

This wasn’t the first patent battle between the companies. For example, FierceWireless reported on a patent case verdict that went Comcast’s way last year.

This story was originally published February 6, 2015 at 5:51 PM with the headline "Jury awards Sprint $27.6 million in patent dispute with Comcast."