Ocado Group PLC (LSE:OCDO) (Ocado Group PLC (LSE:OCDO)) was delivered a big legal win overnight in a patent infringement case in the US against Norwegian firm AutoStore.
In an initial determination, a judge at the International Trade Commission ruled that three patents filed by Ocado rival AutoStore are invalid, with the FTSE 100 company not infringing on a fourth.
The decision remains to be reviewed by the commission before a final verdict is released, which is expected in April.
AutoStore noted that this initial determination was judged invalid "based on a narrow legal issue" and that it intends to challenge the decision before the full commission reviews the findings.
AutoStore, which has been going since the 1990s, has also filed various legal complaints against Ocado in the UK and other jurisdictions since 2016.
After the US ruling overnight, Ocado said: “This was a misconceived attempt by AutoStore to interfere with our business in the United States.”
AutoStore chief executive Karl Johan Lier said: “The issues on which the Administrative Law Judge reached his preliminary finding on validity contradict the determination of the US Patent and Trademark Office, which refused to invalidate the patents at issue in this case. We will raise these issues with the full Commission, and we will continue to defend our intellectual property not only in the ITC but also in all other relevant venues.”
In its UK filing, made last year, AutoStore said it is the inventor and rightful owner of certain patents filed by Ocado since June 2014 relating to the methods, systems and apparatus for controlling the movement of robots in automated storage and retrieval grid systems such as the Ocado Smart Platform.
Separately, Ocado said it continues actively to pursue its claims against AutoStore for infringement of Ocado's patents in both the US and Europe. It said it anticipates court determinations injuncting AutoStore and awarding Ocado damages for AutoStore's infringement of Ocado's patents.
-- Updating with comment from Ocado statement about its claims against AutoStore --