Verizon (Blue Jeans Network) (3:22-cv-01055) has filed a Northern District of California complaint against Anixa Biosciences, Inc. (f/k/a ITUS Corporation) subsidiary Meetrix IP, LLC, seeking declaratory judgments of noninfringement of four patents generally related to encrypted audio/video conferencing. Blue Jeans Network pleads that Meetrix “filed a complaint against BlueJean’s parent company, VCI [Verizon Communications Inc.]” in December 2021, targeting the “BlueJeans by Verizon [Virtual] Meetings, Webinars/Events, Connected Rooms, and Telehealth” videoconferencing products. Verizon has filed a motion to dismiss that Western District of Texas case for lack of personal jurisdiction.

Meetrix IP, LLC, a subsidiary of publicly traded Anixa Biosciences, Inc. (f/k/a ITUS Corporation), has revived its second litigation campaign, begun in September 2016, with separate suits filed against Verizon (6:21-cv-01289) and Zoho (6:21-cv-01288) in the Western District of Texas. The NPE asserts five patents generally related to encrypted audio/video conferencing, with the defendants accused of infringement through the provision of their respective video conferencing platforms.

The growing use of Zoom conferencing products during the global COVID-19 pandemic appears to have caught the attention of Meetrix IP, LLC. In its first lawsuit since April 2018, the subsidiary of publicly traded Anixa Biosciences, Inc. (f/k/a ITUS Corporation) has sued Zoom Video (1:20-cv-02022) in the District of Colorado over the provision of its video conferencing platform. The four asserted patents generally relate to encrypted audio/video conferencing.

In the summer of 2015, publicly traded NPE ITUS Corporation, announced executive changes and a new focus for the company’s future business: cancer diagnostics. This past November, ITUS continued its apparent pivot away from patent assertion, forming a new subsidiary to develop “immuno-therapy drugs against cancer”, revealing an initial focus on ovarian cancer, and indicating that the company will remain engaged in “limited patent licensing activities in the area of encrypted audio/video conference calling” only as part of its “legacy operations”, which would not “require material financial resources or attention of senior management”. Nevertheless, this past week, ITUS subsidiary Meetrix IP, LLC filed separate lawsuits against Cisco (1:18-cv-00309) and Microsoft (1:18-cv-00310), targeting the defendants’ WebEx and Skype (and Skype for Business) products, respectively, each with patents from its “encrypted audio/video conference calling” portfolio.

CopyTele’s 10-K for the year ending October 31, 2013 revealed the company’s first revenue and licenses since converting to a patent assertion entity. CopyTele (CTI) reported $389,000 in licensing revenue in its fiscal fourth quarter. The company entered into four licensing agreements on two of their portfolios in October 2013: Three of the settlements were in connection with CTI’s window frame construction technology (Tafco Corporation, RGF Industries, and Elixir Industries) and one settlement involved CTI’s loyalty conversion systems portfolio (Alaska Air Group). For CTI’s full fiscal year, inventor royalties and litigation, licensing, and contingent legal fees combined totaled $317,000, or 82% of revenue. Based on reported revenue and the four disclosed settlements, CTI’s average settlement amount was less than $100,000.