Context: The 802.11ax Standard, which is commonly known as the Wi-Fi 6 standard, was developed by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) and has been substantially contributed to by Marvell Technology, Inc., NXP Semiconductors N.V., and ZTE Corporation. Velocity Communication Technologies, LLC is a non-practising entity (NPE) that owns a portfolio of over 220 patents developed by companies in the field of wireless communications, including Marvell, NXP, Freescale Semiconductor, Inc., Blackberry, and ZTE.
What’s new: Velocity has filed 11 separate patent infringement disputes against Acer, ASUSTeK, Cisco, D-Link, HP, Juniper Networks, Lenovo, LG Electronics, OnePlus, TP-Link, Hewlett-Packard Enterprise Company, and Aruba Networks, LLC over the same 11 patents in the Eastern District of Texas. The NPE has accused all of the defendants of “willful, wanton, malicious, bad-faith, deliberate, consciously wrongful, flagrant, or characteristic of a pirate” patent infringement.
Direct impact and wider ramifications: This follows a wave of patent litigation in the WiFi 6 arena, including a long-running dispute between Huawei and Netgear, which the parties settled earlier this year (January 4, 2025 ip fray article). Other NPEs have also been relatively active in the enforcement of WiFi 6 patents, including the likes of Atlas Global – although that specific company could be at risk of losing four of the patents in an enforcement campaign it started against Acer, HP, TP-Link, and Vantiva (April 23, 2025 ip fray article).
The patents-in-suit include:
- U.S. Patent No. 8,675,570 (“Scalable OFDM and OFDMA bandwidth allocation in communication systems”)
- U.S. Patent No. 8,260,213 (“Method and apparatus to adjust a tunable reactive element”)
- U.S. Patent No. 8,238,832 (“Antenna optimum beam forming for multiple protocol coexistence on a wireless device”)
- U.S. Patent No. 8,270,343 (“Broadcasting of textual and multimedia information”)
- U.S. Patent No. 8,213,870 (“Beamforming using predefined spatial mapping matrices”)
- U.S. Patent No. 8,644,765 (“Beamforming using predefined spatial mapping matrices”)
- U.S. Patent No. 9,083,401 (“Beamforming using predefined spatial mapping matrices”)
- U.S. Patent No. 10,200,096 (“Beamforming using predefined spatial mapping matrices”)
- U.S. Patent No. 8,238,859 (“Radio receiver”)
- U.S. Patent No. 8,265,573 (“Wireless subscriber communication unit and method of power control with back-off therefore”)
- U.S. Patent No. 9,596,648 (“Unified beacon format”)
In each of the 11 complaints, the NPE made the same following allegations about all of the defendants:
- They believed with high probability that its Wi-Fi 6 products infringed but took deliberate action to avoid learning further details of its infringement; and
- The infringement is best described as willful, wanton, malicious, in bad faith, deliberate, consciously wrongful, flagrant, or characteristic of a pirate.
The patents changed hands a couple of times, but the defendants were all aware that these patents existed, it alleged:
- Each has known that NXP owned WiFi 6-related patents since at least September 29, 2020, when the former patentee submitted a Letter of Assurance (LOA) for essential patent claims to the IEEE, indicating that NXP owned patents that may be essential to the implementation of 802.11ax.
- They also knew that ZTE was the developer of some of the patents-in-suit since at least March 4, 2024, when ZTE submitted a LOA to the IEEE, indicating that it owned patents that may be essential to the implementation of the 802.11ax Standard.
- On April 15, 2025, Velocity became the new owner of the patents-in-suit, and counsel sent each of them a letter explaining that its patent portfolio covers technologies “incorporated into the Wi-Fi 6 standard” and invited each of the defendants to license the patents-in-suit.
Below are a few examples of the alleged infringing products of each of the defendants:
- Acer: Aspire 3 Laptops, Chromebook 315, Connect M4 5G Mobile Hotspot Portable Routers, and Nitro 5 Laptops, among others.
- ASUSTeK: A3402 Computers, AI2501 Smartphones, Chromebook CM 14 Flip Laptops, and Prime A620- Plus Motherboards, among others.
- Cisco Systems: Cisco Catalyst 9105 Series Access Points, among others.
- D-Link: AX1800 Access Points and Aquila Pro AI AX3000 Smart WiFi 6 Routers, among others.
- HP: Chromebook, Chromebook Plus, Elite Mini 14th gen Desktops, and Envy, among others.
- Juniper Networks: AP12 Access Point, among others.
- Lenovo: ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 8, Motorola Edge, and Motorola Razr+, among others.
- LG Electronics: Class OLED Flex Smart TVs, CloudDevice All-in-One Thin Client Computers, and LG Velvet 5G Smartphones, among others.
- OnePlus: OnePlus 10 Pro, and OnePlus Pad, among others.
- TP-Link: Archer AX10, Deco BE68, EAP610, and Festa F61, among others.
- Hewlett-Packard Enterprise Company, Aruba Networks, LLC: Aruba 9004 Gateway, and Instant On Access Point AP25, among others.
Sample complaint
Counsel
Velocity is being represented by Berger & Hipskind LLP’s Daniel P. Hipskind, Dorian S. Berger, and Erin E. McCracken, as well as Elizabeth L. DeRieux at Capshaw DeRieux LLP.