By: Sharon Urias, Esq.
A Manhattan jury earlier this month ordered Nintendo to pay $30.2 million in damages to Tomita Technologies for patent infringement. The jury found that Nintendo used Tomita’s 3D technology in the Nintendo 3DS without permission.
Sejiro Tomita worked for Nintendo for thirty years until 2002. After leaving the company, he applied for the patent in issue in March of 2003, and the patent was issued in 2008 licensed to Tomita Technologies. However, before the patent was issued, Tomita met with Nintendo representatives in August of 2003 to show them his new technology, stereoscopic image picking up and display system based upon optical axes cross-point information – also known as ‘664 patent. This technology shows 3D images that can be viewed without the use of special 3D glasses.
After the showing of his new technology to company representatives, Tomita was asked by Nintendo reps to provide a sample of the technology to the company. However, Tomita explained that despite requesting a licensing agreement or payment, he received no response from the company and had no further communications with Nintendo from that time until 2011 when he filed the patent infringement lawsuit.
In 2012, U.S. District Judge Jed Rakoff, denied Nintendo’s motions for judgment without a trial by writing in a memo, “A reasonable jury could find, based on clear and convincing evidence, that Nintendo’s defenses are so unpersuasive that an objectively high likelihood of infringement in fact exists.”
In his ruling, Judge Rakoff also mentioned the fact that those four employees that headed up the development of Nintendo’s 3DS gaming system were in attendance during Tomita’s demonstration of his 3D technology.
The law firm that represented Mr. Tomita in an emailed statement thanked the jury for “their diligence in this case.”
In a statement, Nintendo said “it was confident that the result will be set aside,” and the “verdict will not impact the sales” of its gaming systems in this country.
