Another patent lawsuit has surfaced.
This one concerns Affinity Labs of Texas, which has filed a lawsuit claiming Clear Channel’s iHeartRadio platform violates Affinity patents for receiving streamed FM audio signals over a wireless device as well as how the station information is displayed on such a device.
The suit was filed in March and is only now coming to light.
The Labs is headed by patent attorney Russell White and intellectual property attorney Harlie Frost. Both previously worked at AT&T, according to the company website.
A lawsuit filed by Duane Morris law firm attorney Thomas Sankey in federal court in Texas makes 14 claims on behalf of Affinity. For example, one claim concerns how audio information is displayed when your device is outside the station’s contour. Another claim concerns “instructions provide a search engine to search for selected media information based on at least one of artist, song, and genre.”
Affinity claims Clear Channel is in violation of its Patent #7,970,379, issued in 2011. Affinity is demanding a jury trial and seeks “treble” damages.
A Clear Channel representative told Radio World the company does not comment on ongoing legal matters.
