Google sued Sonos in return claiming it infringed five of its patents

Photo credits: Lauren Edvalson, TDR-Resources, Charles Deluvio
 

Google sued back Sonos for the lawsuit it filed back in January in which Sonos claimed that Google has infringed five of its patents that are related to "setup, control, and synchronization of multiroom network speaker systems." Google has said that they won't usually sue other companies for copyright infringement but did so to "assert its intellectual property rights."

In January of this year, Sonos sued Google for patent infringement and said that Google took advantage of working with them in integrating Play Music and Google Assistant in Sonos speakers and asked for several demands likes sharing the product roadmap for six months and asking to only make Google Assitant available in its speakers.

Google Spokesperson Jose Castaneda told The Verge that "We are disappointed that Sonos has made false claims about our work together and technology, we are reluctantly defending ourselves by asserting our patent rights. While we look to resolve our dispute, we will continue to ensure our shared customers have the best experience using our products."

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Google also claimed that Sonos infringed five of its patents that are related to "mesh networking, echo cancellation, DRM, content notifications, and personalized search," the lawsuit reads "While Google rarely sues other companies for patent infringement, it must assert its intellectual property rights here.”

Sonos CEO Patrick Spence has already testified before the House Antitrust Committee regarding the earlier lawsuit they failed against Google and said that while Amazon accepted to integrate its voice assistant along with Google's, Google demanded that its Assistant should be standalone in the speakers and refused to provide its voice assistant otherwise.

The lawsuit by Google further reads, "Google is proud of its more than five-year partnership with Sonos, and has worked constructively with Sonos to make the companies’ products work seamlessly by building special integrations for Sonos, for instance, when Google rolled out the ability to set a Sonos speaker as the default option for Google Assistant, it was the first time Google had done that for any partner company.”

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Regarding the lawsuit filed in reverse by Google, Sonos CEO Patrick Spence responded and told The Verge that "Instead of simply addressing the merits of our case, and paying us what we’re owed, Google has chosen to use their size and breadth to try and find areas in which they can retaliate. We look forward to winning our original case, and winning this newly filed retaliatory case as well."

He continued to make serious allegations that Google shamelessly copied various innovations from smaller American tech companies like Eero and Zoom to expand their strength in new markets, he said, "we’re mostly sad to see a once innovative company that started with the mission of ‘Do No Evil’ avoid addressing the fact they’ve infringed on our inventions, and have instead turned to strong arm tactics that the robber barons of old would have applauded."

Via, The Verge.