Las Vegas jury awards Oracle $50 million
LAS VEGAS — A federal court jury in Nevada has ordered a Las Vegas software maintenance firm and its chief executive to pay a little more than $50 million in damages to technology giant Oracle International Corp. in a copyright infringement lawsuit.
Redwood City’s Oracle had sought nearly $246 million.
The verdict this week against Las Vegas-based Rimini Street Inc. and CEO Seth Ravin followed a two-week trial in U.S. District Court in Las Vegas. It focused on copies of J.D. Edwards and Siebel-branded Enterprise software.
Ravin was found jointly liable for $14.4 million of the $50 million figure.
Statements from the two companies on Friday showed the fight was not over.
Oracle said it’ll seek a court order barring Rimini Street from continuing to do business “based on massive infringement.”
“This case certainly was not about an honest dispute over licensing terms, as Rimini pretends,” Oracle said. “It was about IP theft, pure and simple. Rimini and Seth Ravin got caught, and now they have to pay. “
A Rimini Street statement derided the idea of a court injunction as meaningless, because it said Rimini Street no longer uses the processes at issue.
It said the jury found the company liable only for “innocent,” not “willful,” property right infringement, and that Oracle suffered no lost profits.
“The use by Oracle of the term ‘IP theft’ is purely defamatory,” the Rimini Street statement said. The company promised “forthcoming court filings.”
Rimini Street is suing Oracle in another case, asking the court to confirm that Rimini Street’s new processes for PeopleSoft update development don’t infringe on Oracle copyrights.
The jury verdict this week came in a lawsuit filed in 2010. It focused on computer software maintenance and upgrade services provided by Oracle for its licensed systems and offered by Rimini Street as a third-party provider.
U.S. District Judge Larry Hicks ruled in August 2014 that Rimini Street violated the copyrights of the two Oracle products and ordered the jury trial on damages.
The jury didn’t grant punitive damages.