Facebook’s Oculus hit with virtual reality patent suit

Techno View IP, a California-based technology licensing company, has hit Oculus, Facebook’s virtual reality subsidiary, with a patent infringement claim.

The lawsuit, filed on Thursday, April 6 at the US District Court for the District of Delaware, alleged that Oculus had incorporated a competitor’s technology into its Rift headset.

Manuel Rafael Gutierrez Novelo is the inventor of the technology and CEO of virtual reality headset maker ImmersiON-VRelia. Techno View IP licenses the patent from ImmersiON-VRelia.

The Rift is designed to allow people to enter an immersive computer-generated environment such as a computer game or a movie scene.

Techno View IP claimed that Oculus had infringed US patent number 7,666,096, called “Method for generating the left and right perspectives in a 3D video game”.

According to the complaint, the patent covers the conversion of 2D images into 3D versions, with faster execution of gaming software through data compression.

The ‘096 patent is part of a family of patents that also includes US number 8,206,218, called “3D video game system”, and US number 9,503,74, called “System and method for decoding 3D stereoscopic digital video”.

Techno View IP is seeking compensatory damages, triple damages, a jury trial, attorneys’ fees and further relief that the court deems just and proper.

This lawsuit follows a $500 million verdict against Oculus, again centring on its Rift headset.

In February this year, WIPR reported that a Texas jury awarded the damages to video game developer ZeniMax Media after finding copyright and trademark infringement and breach of a non-disclosure agreement.