Western Digital is synonymous with hard drives and system storage. Its competitors must be envious of this brand recognition. A Californian jury ruled that Western Digital violated patent rights and owed $262m in damages.
MR Technologie (MRT), a subsidiary of Western Digital, sued the company in August 2022. It claimed that Western Digital had violated two patents filed in August by Dieter Seuss. He is a professor at the University of Vienna and the owner of MRT.
Patents were issued for methods that help bits change directions by using anisotropy effects. The lawsuit alleged several Western Digital hard drive products contained technologies that infringed on the patent techniques.
MRT's attorneys reportedly accused WD using these methods in a way that allowed it to increase the density of the HDDs from 300 Gbit/sqin to 1,000 Gbit/sqin. According to a transcript obtained by Reuters from MRT's attorney Mark Fenster, Russ August & Kabat, during closing arguments, Fenster said:
Western Digital wouldn't be able compete on the market without these inventions.
Douglas Lumish, Western Digital's attorney, disagreed. "MRT’s lawyers have given Dr. Suess false credit to a pretty magnificent extent for the work done by thousands of [Western Digital] Engineers over decades and around the globe."
Western Digital said it would appeal the decision "as quickly as possible".
To a company with a net worth estimated at $20.86 billion on August 16, this year, $262m in damages might seem like a small amount. Western Digital will be hurt by the accusations that it violated patents in order to compete on the storage market. It is likely that WD will do all that it can to remove the unsightly mark. You thought spinning platters were boring, didn't you?
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