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Apple slapped with $24M fine for stealing tech from old SkyTel pagers

Published Nov 18th, 2014 11:45AM EST
Apple Patent Infringement

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Apple on Tuesday was ordered to pay a $23.6 million fine to Texas-based Mobile Telecommunications Technologies after being found guilty on Monday evening of infringing six patents. A federal jury in Marshall, Texas determined that Apple’s iPhone and several other Apple devices make unlawful use of the patented technologies, which relate to pagers and date back to the 1990s.

This marks the second recent trial in which Apple was accused of stealing pager technology — the first was in California last month and Apple escaped unscathed.

The patents in question in this more recent trial are from Mobile Telecommunications’ old SkyTel pagers, which were extremely popular in the 1990s but are now outdated. Bloomberg notes that the patents covered in the case are all either recently expired or will expire soon.

Zach Epstein
Zach Epstein Executive Editor

Zach Epstein has been the Executive Editor at BGR for more than 10 years. He manages BGR’s editorial team and ensures that best practices are adhered to. He also oversees the Ecommerce team and directs the daily flow of all content. Zach first joined BGR in 2007 as a Staff Writer covering business, technology, and entertainment.

His work has been quoted by countless top news organizations, and he was recently named one of the world's top 10 “power mobile influencers” by Forbes. Prior to BGR, Zach worked as an executive in marketing and business development with two private telcos.