US trade body probed Sonos infringed on a Google patents

• The US International Trade Commission announced on Friday that it would investigate claims made by Alphabet’s Google against Sonos.
• Google alleges that Sonos’ voice-assistant technology infringes on a number of Google patents.

The US International Trade Commission announced on Friday that it would investigate claims made by Alphabet Inc.’s Google against Sonos that the home-audio company infringed on Google patents by importing specific audio components.

The agency declined to specify which particular goods were purportedly imported in possible violation of American trade law.

It claimed that no decision had been reached on the case’s merits as of yet.

Additional lawsuits in California, Canada, France, Germany, the Netherlands, and other jurisdictions have been filed in the ongoing patent dispute between the former partners regarding audio and smart speaker technologies.

The trade commission issued a restriction on select Google devices’ imports after Sonos prevailed.

Google filed a legal action in federal court in California last month, alleging that Sonos’ new voice-assistant technology infringes on a number of Google patents. Sonos has called those lawsuits an “intimidation tactic.”

The trade commission announced that it would schedule an evidentiary hearing and set a deadline of 45 days to conclude its investigation into Google’s most recent allegations.

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