Verizon Drops VOIP Patent Suit on Vonage

June 20, 2006 By Geoff Duncan

Vonage takes another one on the chin as, out of nowhere, telecommunication giant Verizon claims Vonage's VOIP technology violates its patents.

Telecommunications giant Verizon has filed suit in a U.S. District Court in Richmond, Virginia, against VOIP operator Vonage, claiming Vonage’s VOIP technology violates seven Verizon patents. And it’s a pretty heady complaint, asking that the court shut down Vonage because it’s infringing on core Verizon patents covering transferring data between packet-switched and circuit-switched networks.

The lawsuit is another thorn in the side for Vonage, which is currently facing class action lawsuits from customers claiming the company violated stock security regulations in its much-publicized but lackluster IPO in late May. Verizon’s lawsuit makes the wound sting even more by citing declarations in Vonage’s IPO filings as evidence of infringement.

If Verizon makes good its case, Vonage would undoubtedly have to pay royalties on the technologies found to belong to Verizon, in addition to domages and any other penalities assessed by the court. For its part, Vonage has acknowledged the suit but stresses it believes its technology was either developed in-house or licensed appropriately from third parties, and it intends to vigorously defend itself. According to Vonage, Verizon did not confront the company prior to filing suit.

The possible merits of Verizon’s case are difficult to asses at first blush: most VOIP technology is based on Session Initiation Protocol (SIP), an open standard to which Verizon has no patent claim.

Showing 4 comments

Jeremiah at 3:34pm 18th February 2007 To be frank I would love to see vonage go down. They are a horrible company, when they first came out years back I was excited and signed up. From there it was all good, never any internet issues phone issues until I moved. I tried to cxl service sence the condo i was moving into had a phone deal already. They said everything was ok and then continued to take money from my account. 4 calls later it was finally fixed, and no money was refunded to me. Just recently my girlfriend got vonage beacuse her verizon cellphone bill was reaching the hundreds monthly. Sence then, our internet crash's every 5 minutes, the audio drops durring calls. Dont even try to call their customer service. If you don't get hung up on you will spend about an hour on hold, just to get someone that does not speak english. I'm not saying that is a bad thing but when you are providing support to someone that only speaks one language which is english, you can see where that may be an issue. Anyway we spent 2 hours on the phone, I ended up solving the issue on google while waiting, and taught the rep I spoke with how to fix the issue. Still, the phone doesn't work and the audio still drops. Vonage is a waiste of money, and they are harder to quit than AOL
marc at 11:44pm 21st June 2006 I was wondering if Vonage had any value as a stock with the stock price tanking....However, Verizon must think it has some value, maybe great value, or why else would they sue Vonage at this point? Verizon's complaint lays out how Vonage has been "stealing" millions of Verizon's customers....Verizon must be worried about Vonage continuing to take away all of its customers.
Tim Stevens at 12:10pm 20th June 2006 I've heard good and bad things about Vonage. I hear that the quality can be pretty bad, and that the service sucks.

What are other options us consumers have? I think Comcast here on the west coast offers service. Is it good?
James at 9:20am 20th June 2006 Good, put Vonage out of business, that company has a crappy product and takes advantage of their customers.