Sonos sued Google for patent infringement in January 2020. The streaming speaker company won an early victory today with the U.S. International Trade Commission. Charles Bullock, chief administrative law judge at the ITC, has issued a preliminary ruling that found Google had infringed five patents.The ALJ ruled today that all five Sonos patents were valid. Google also infringes all five patents. Sonos Chief Legal Officer Eddie Lazarus stated in a statement to TechCrunch. We are happy that the ITC confirmed Google's blatant infringement of Sonos patent inventions. This affirms the strength of our portfolio and marks a significant milestone in our long-term quest to protect our innovation from misappropriation by Big Tech Monopolies.It is early days for what will likely be a much longer battle between the companies. Sonos' complaint is based on Googles streaming speakers. Google joined the long-dominated category with its original Home speaker four and a quarter years ago. A number of products are now available under the Nest brand.Sonos CEO Patrick Spence stated that Google had been openly and knowingly copying our patent technology. Despite our numerous and sustained efforts over the past few years, Google has yet to show any willingness or desire to collaborate with us on a mutually advantageous solution. We were forced to take legal action.Sonos noticed similar problems with Amazon devices (Google's chief competitor in this category at the time), but decided to concentrate its resources, time and money on a fight with Google.Sonos hopes to use the ITC in order to stop the import of these smart speakers and other Google hardware like the Chromecast or Pixels. This would be a huge blow to Google's hardware ambitions. Although a final ruling is not expected until December 13, a possible import ban will be in effect within 60 days.
