On November 12, plaintiff Core Optical Technologies filed a complaint against defendant Nokia Corporation (Core Optical Technologies v. Nokia Corporation and Nokia of America Corporation 8:19-cv-2190) for patent infringement in the Central District of California Southern Division.
The patent-in-suit was U.S. Patent No. 6,782,211, (“the ’211 Patent”) entitled “Cross Polarization Interface [sic] Canceler” issued in August 2004. The complaint stated that “the pioneering technology forth in the ’211 patent greatly increases data transmission rates in fiber optic networks, by enabling two optical signals transmitted in the same frequency band, but at generally orthogonal polarizations, to be recovered at a receiver.” The complaint further explained the details of this patented technology and how it works. The complaint alleged that Nokia used this technology in their packet-optical transport solutions and products.
The complaint alleged the infringing Nokia product lines include the 1830 Photonic Service Switch (PSS) product family, the 1830 Photonic Service Interconnect (PSI) product family, the 1620 SOFTNODE product family, and the WaveLite Metro 200. These products infringed upon at least claims 30, 33, 35 and 37 of the ’211 Patent.
The 1830 PSS product family infringed on at least claim 33. According to the Nokia website and complaint, the “‘1830 PSS portfolio helps you optimize optical networks,’ by ‘supporting efficient, high-performance 100G–600G wavelength transport.’ Thus, the 1830 PSS Family includes components that ‘receiv[e] an optical signal over a single fiber optic transmission medium,’ as recited in element 33(a).” The complaint stated how the Nokia devices used dual polarization and polarization division multiplexing and polarization interference mitigation, further infringing on claim 33 of the patent. Including the use of Application-Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC) which performs polarization demultiplexing.
The complaint stated that the 1830 PSI Family uses “‘coherent optical line ports based on industry leading Nokia PSE-3 and PSE-2 digital signal processors.’ On information and belief of the plaintiffs, these “coherent optical line ports,” and associated equipment, perform polarization-division multiplexing and matrix-based cross-polarization interference mitigation, in the same way as the 1830 PSS Family.”
The 1620 SOFTNODE family is undersea optical networking equipment. It is believed the Nokia acquired this product when it acquired Alcatel-Lucent, a French telecom equipment company. The complaint alleged that to achieve its data rate claims it must have used polarization-division multiplexing with cross-polarization interference mitigation, thus also infringing claim 33 of the ’211 Patent.
The complaint alleged that, as to the WaveLite Metro 200, the only way to achieve its data rate claims with the specified modulations is to perform polarization-division multiplexing with cross-polarization interference mitigation, an infringement of claim 33 of the ’211 Patent. Other examples are given of the necessary use of the polarization-division multiplexing with cross-polarization interference mitigation.
The complaint has stated three counts of infringement: direct patent infringement, inducement of infringement and contributory infringement. Core Optical has sought relief for damages.
