Brocade And A10 Networks Settle Long-Running Patent Dispute

Storage networking specialist Brocade and application networking company A10 Networks have decided to settle a protracted legal tussle over patents, just an hour before they were scheduled to appear in front of the jury.

The competitors reached a “full and complete agreement on all pending legal disputes” related to the AX line of application delivery controllers, although the terms of the settlement were not disclosed.

The patent infringement case was running for over two years. In January, a federal court upheld more than half of $112 million (£70m) in damages awarded to Brocade after a trial the previous summer.

Make love, not war

In 2008, Brocade bought networking switch and router vendor Foundry Networks for $3 billion to help it compete against larger rivals, such as Cisco Systems. Lee Chen was instrumental in setting up Foundry Networks, but left in 2004 to create A10.

Even though all of intellectual property belonging to Foundry Networks changed ownership, Chen and his company went on to sell AX controllers, which contained the same code found in Brocade’s ServerIron products.

In August 2012, a jury found A10 guilty of patent infringement, copyright infringement, trade secret violations and unfair competition. Brocade was awarded $60 million and A10 ordered to stop selling some of its AX controllers. In response, the company promptly designed an alternative AX series that avoided using the patents in question.

The trial on Wednesday was meant to establish whether Brocade was to be awarded more money. But the hearing didn’t happen. An hour before the jury in San Jose was due to listen to the opening statements in damages trial, the two companies decided to smoke a peace pipe and bury the hatchet.

“We are pleased with this outcome for A10 and Brocade to settle our disputes with an amicable agreement,” said Chen. “This allows A10 to continue to put customers first with a sharp focus on providing the industry’s most versatile, scalable and efficient platforms for intelligent cloud services.”

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