TCL Loss in Essential Patent Case Survives Bid for Appeal Redo

TCL Communication Technology Holdings Ltd. failed to convince the full Federal Circuit to reconsider a panel decision upholding a jury verdict that it owed nearly $1 million for infringing wireless patents.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit held for the first time in August that the question of whether a patent is essential to a technological standard doesn’t have to be resolved by the court before trial but can be decided by a jury. The court denied TCL’s motion for en banc rehearing in a nonprecedential order.

The decision reinforces the role juries play in standard ...