Comcast's complex legal battle with one of the technology vendors behind its current “10G” network upgrade has heated up, with Carlsbad, California-based chipmaker MaxLinear countersuing the cable operator earlier this month.
MaxLinear claims in a Dec. 1 New York federal court filing that Comcast stole trade secrets associated with Full Duplex DOCSIS 4.0 technology. The suit is accessible here.
Lightreading, which has reported on this dispute since Comcast filed an initial complaint back in May, was also the first to report on the countersuit.
MaxLinear said in its suit that it “developed and shared” new technologies related to FDX DOCSIS 4.0 gateways “with the hope that Comcast would purchase and deploy them in service of the more than 14 million Comcast households that already use MaxLinear chips (and beyond). But Comcast had a different plan. While Comcast simultaneously lauded MaxLinear’s new technology as part of its future plans, Comcast scaled back its existing purchase orders of MaxLinear products and ultimately ceased the purchase of any new MaxLinear products altogether.”
The cable operator provided this response to Next TV: “Comcast treats confidentiality and contractual obligations with the utmost respect, and contrary to MaxLinear’s claim, Comcast engineers independently created our FDX-amplifier technology in conjunction with another trusted vendor. MaxLinear’s allegations are completely without merit, and we look forward to demonstrating that in court.”
Untangling the key through lines of this complex legal battle is challenging, but there seems to be a lot more to this case than a client taking a vendor's tech and then eighty-sixing the relationship.
The dispute seems to have started way back in 2015 when MaxLinear paid $287 million to acquire Entropic, a company in nearby San Diego that holds numerous patents related to MoCA (Multimedia over Coax Alliance).
Evolving into a patent troll monikered Entropic Communications, the unit back in February sued Comcast, Charter Communications, Cox Communications, Dish Network and DirecTV, claiming they were violating 20 of its MoCA patents. (Notably, Charter entered into a settlement agreement with Entropic earlier this week.)
As there were reportedly written up, MaxLinear’s “vendor service agreement” (VSA) and “statement of work” (SOW) with Comcast held provisions that prohibited lawsuits from being filed against the client. So, to clear the legal path for its Entropic unit to sue the cable operator, Comcast claims MaxLinear abruptly and improperly ended its VSA and SOW.
“MaxLinear has attempted to terminate the VSA and SOW in breach of both Agreements as part of a transparent attempt to further its financial interests in patent litigation,” Comcast said in its May lawsuit filing in the Southern District of New York. “Rather than deal with the realities of the VSA’s express terms, MaxLinear apparently thinks it can render the covenant irrelevant by terminating — improperly — the VSA and SOW. It cannot do so, and its attempted termination is a clear violation of both Agreements.”
