TV Data Company Alphonso Obtains Dismissal of Half of Patent Case in Dispute with Samba TV

MOUNTAIN VIEW, CA--(Marketwired - September 14, 2017) - TV data company Alphonso today announced that Samba TV has dismissed half of its patent infringement suit against the company, based on a failure of evidence of infringement by Alphonso.

In November 2015, Samba filed a lawsuit against Alphonso, claiming Alphonso had infringed Samba's U.S. Patent No. 9,026,668, entitled "Real-Time and Targeted Advertising on Multiple Screens of a User Watching Television." In July 2016, Samba filed a second lawsuit, claiming Alphonso infringed another Samba patent, U.S. Patent No. 9,386,356, entitled "Targeting with Television Audience Data Across Multiple Screens." Alphonso continues to fight Samba's '356 patent in the court. It has also initiated an inter partes review proceeding in the United States Patent & Trademark Office attacking the validity of the Samba patent.

Samba initially filed the lawsuits in the Eastern District of Texas, a district known to strongly favor plaintiffs in patent suits. Neither Samba nor Alphonso has its headquarters in Texas. In March 2017, on Alphonso's motion and in the face of resistance by Samba, the court ordered that the case be transferred to the Northern District of California, where both companies are headquartered.

In March 2017, the court also rejected certain key arguments asserted by Samba regarding how the '668 patent should be interpreted, and which were the basis for Samba's claim that the patent covered Alphonso's technology. In light of the court's interpretation of the '668 patent, Samba was unable to prove that the '668 patent was infringed by Alphonso, and last week Samba was compelled to drop its claim that Alphonso infringes the '668 patent.

Alphonso Chief Executive Officer Ashish Chordia hailed Samba's dismissal of its claim that Alphonso infringes its '668 patent as a victory for innovation, commenting: "Alphonso had no doubt that Samba's claims on the '668 patent were entirely without foundation. We have a deep patent and technology portfolio for our process for TV-to-digital retargeting, with seven patents issued and many more filed or pending. This enables us to provide a service that other companies can't match, so sometimes they turn to litigation rather than innovation to compete. In our view, the collapse of Samba's case on the '668 patent further validates our own technology and IP that we continue to build on, to create new forms of advertising, analytics, media buying and planning, and closed loop attribution for brands."

Alphonso is represented by attorneys at Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan LLP.

About Alphonso
Alphonso is a TV data company and the market leader in providing brands and agencies with verified TV audiences on mobile devices and the web. Its Alphonso TV Data Cloud services power TV retargeting and brand insights for hundreds of the Fortune 500 brands and agencies in the U.S. The company enables its clients to amplify their TV spend with digital, and to reach targeted TV demographics across all screens.

With automatic content recognition (ACR) technology embedded in tens of millions of hardware and software products including smart TVs, TV chipsets, mobile apps, gaming consoles and streaming devices, Alphonso understands what programming and advertising people are watching on TV. Through its Alphonso Insights SaaS offering, Alphonso delivers actionable insights and closed-loop attribution with offline data in real time, to helps its customers understand the true impact of TV advertising. To learn more, visit www.alphonso.tv.