Netflix has prevailed in a suit against it filed by a patent company, which saw its legal strategy backfire when it tried switching courts to gain a more favorable ruling.
A U.S. federal appeals court described the legal strategy executed by Realtime Adaptive Streaming LLC as "blatant gamesmanship," and ruled that the Texas patent troll must reimburse Netflix $409,000 in attorney's fees.
According to Reuters, Realtime originally sued Netflix in Delaware back in 2017, but it dropped its claim two years later when the judge invalidated four of its patents. It filed a new suit against Netflix in Los Angeles the very next day, in a court that had already ruled in its favor in another case.
The Los Angeles court award Netflix the attorneys fees, ruling that Realtime was "totally unjustified" in moving its complaint to another court when its Delaware case was "undeniably tanking."
Realtime appealed to the Federal Circuit, arguing that mere "forum shopping alone is an unprecedented basis for attorney's fees."
But the federal court affirmed the Los Angeles court's decision, accusing Realtime of "misuse of the ability to refile to wipe the slate clean."
Neither Netflix nor Realtime has commented publicly on the matter.
