A federal jury found Apple guilty this week of illegally using a patent owned by the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation. The jury is set to decide the settlement amount Friday.
In the mid 1990s, University of Wisconsin-Madison researchers patented a computer processor that could carry out tasks faster and more efficiently.
That technology can be found in various Apple products but the tech giant didn’t get a license to use it. That could cost the company up to $862 million.
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But according to Shubha Ghosh, a professor of intellectual property law at UW-Madison, the final number will be based on a lot of different variables. He said it’s unclear when a patent is infringed because they’re broadly written. The $862 million amount assumes Apple is found guilty of willfully infringing WARF’s patent.
“The underlying damage that would have occurred to the patent owner — to WARF — would be about one-fourth of that amount, so about $200 million,” Ghosh said.
He said the money will be dispersed between WARF and the patent researchers. UW-Madison will most likely not receive anything.
This isn’t the first time WARF has defended this particular patent. They filed a lawsuit against Intel for using the technology in the Core2Duo in 2008, settling for $110 million.
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