Overhead Door Corp., the Lewisville-based maker of residential garage-door controllers, won a patent case presented last week to a jury in federal court in East Texas.
The jury of five women and three men, after deliberating less than two hours, found that Overhead Door and a wholly owned division, the Genie Co., had not infringed on patents held by a competitor in the automated garage-door industry, the Chamberlain Group Inc.
The patents in question had to do with garage-door controls that can be operated through wireless networks by a customer using, for example, his or her cellphone.
After a weeklong trial in Marshall before Chief Judge Rodney Gilstrap of the Eastern District of Texas, the jurors agreed that Chamberlain had not established that Overhead Door infringed on its patents.
David K. Callahan, a partner in the Chicago office of Latham & Watkins and the lead attorney for Overhead Door, said: “We are extremely pleased that the jury cleared both Overhead Door and Genie of claims for patent infringement following a thorough consideration of the facts.”
Lawyers for the Chamberlain Group, the plaintiffs in the case, did not return telephone calls or emails seeking comment on the verdict.
In addition to Callahan, Overhead Door was represented by, among others, Aaron Macris, Bradley A. Hyde and Clement Naples of Latham & Watkins and Leon Carter and Joshua J. Bennett of Carter Arnett of Dallas.
Chamberlain was represented by, among others, Ahtoosa Dale, Dillon Kellerman and Eimeric Reig-Plessis of Winston & Strawn and James Travis Underwood and Melissa Richards Smith of Gillam & Smith, which has offices in Tyler and Marshall.