InterDigital launches attack on Disney at multiple venues including UPC

InterDigital claims the streaming platforms Disney+, ESPN+ and Hulu operated by the Walt Disney Company use advanced video compression that falls within the scope of InterDigital’s patents.

According to a press release, InterDigital has filed suits at the United States Federal District Court in the Central District of California (case ID: 2:2025cv00895), Rio de Janeiro State Court in Brazil, at Munich Regional Court in Germany, and at the Unified Patent Court’s local divisions in Mannheim and Düsseldorf.

In the US complaint, InterDigital claims it reached out to Disney in 2022 to request that the parties discuss the licensing of InterDigital’s patented technologies. But negotiations seemingly failed, as the claimant states that Disney is “still not authorised to use InterDigital’s patents”. As a result, the patent owner filed the suits against Disney.

In the US, InterDigital is suing over five video encoding patents (US8,406,301; US10,805,610; US11,381,818; US9,185,268 and US8,085,297). JUVE Patent does not yet know which patents InterDigital is asserting in Europe or the case IDs.

Fast streaming

InterDigital claims its video technologies enable Disney to efficiently stream content. Without the solutions in advanced video compression, claims InterDigital, it would take days to download shows and the load of uncompressed data would severely strain the internet.

The press release states, “Uncompressed, a 4K movie with a run time of 130 minutes translates to 11,600GB of data. At modern internet download speeds, it would take over four and a half days to download that movie. Compressed, using the latest technology of which InterDigital is a leading contributor, it is reduced to approximately 14GB, and can be downloaded in a matter of minutes. Without compression, we’d be back to a world of movie rental stores and DVDs by mail.”

In Disney’s latest financial report for the year ending on 28 September 2024, the company reported annual revenues of nearly $25 billion from its streaming businesses. These count more than 250 million paying subscribers across the different platforms.

Stream of litigation

The importance of streaming is growing as TV viewing habits change. Competition between platforms such as Netflix, Amazon Prime and Disney+ is fierce. This is giving rise to more litigation over the necessary technology, particularly video coding. Prominent examples include Broadcom vs Netflix, DiVx vs Netflix and Nokia vs Amazon Prime.

Furthermore, various proceedings concerning video coding and streaming technology are also pending at the UPC, including one against Disney. In this case, Adeia Guides is suing the entertainment company over two patents at the local divisions in Munich and The Hague.

Equation with unknowns

InterDigital is once again relying on a team of litigators from Arnold Ruess and patent attorneys from df-mp at both the UPC and the Munich Regional Court.

Both firms have already successfully represented the client in infringement and nullity actions against Oppo in Germany. Counsels Lisa Rieth Jan Wergin will assist partners and renowned patent litigators Cordula Schumacher and Arno Riße of Arnold Ruess. Dual-qualified Dominik Ho and patent attorney David Molnia of Munich based df-mp provide technical advice.

In the US, a team from McKool Smith led by Los Angeles litigator Alan Block is representing InterDigital. In Brazil, the company has retained IP practice of full-service firm Licks Attorneys.

JUVE Patent does not yet know which firm Disney has appointed for its defence. In the UPC proceedings against Adeia, a team from Taylor Wessing is representing the group. Munich-based litigator Dietrich Kamlah is in the lead. The team also includes partners Christian Lederer, Michael Schächinger and associate Teresa Gaboardi. Patent attorneys Joel Nägerl and Lorenz Walder-Hartmann of patent attorney firm Zimmermann & Partner provide support in technical matters.