Jury Awards GREE $92 Million in Damages for Supercell’s Patent Infringement

GREE, Inc. v. Supercell Oy
Case No. 2:19-cv-00200
United States District Court for the Eastern District of Texas
Decided May 7, 2021

In yet another instalment in the series of patent disputes between Japanese game maker GREE Inc. (“GREE”), creator of Fishing Star, and Supercell Oy (“Supercell”) the creator of mobile game Clash of Clans, a jury in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas awarded GREE $92.2 million. This patent infringement case follows a series of lawsuits between the two, GREE recently having been awarded $8.5 million for Supercell’s patent infringements in September of 2020.

Here, the jury found that Supercell infringed at least one of the asserted claims among several of GREE’s patents. The patents in the suit were U.S. Patent Nos. 9,079,107 (the ‘107 patent), 9,561,439 (the ‘439 patent), 10,076,708 (the ‘708 patent), 10,413,832 (the ‘832 patent), 10,328,346 (the ‘346 patent), and 10,335,689 (the ‘689 patent). These patents all have to do with improving “freemium” or Gacha games, games which are free but encourage the player to spend money for a better experience. The ‘107 and ‘439 patents concern communicating, storing, and grouping player communications, player-initiated events, and items. The ‘708 and ‘832 patents concern receiving, sending, displaying, and selecting item information and rarity. Lastly, the ‘346 and ‘689 patents relate to methods of selecting and controlling characters and units moving through a divided field when players do battle.

On May 7, 2021 the jury found that GREE had proven by a preponderance of the evidence that Supercell had infringed on at least one of the asserted claims and also had willfully infringed on at least one of the asserted claims. The jury also found that Supercell had not proven by preponderance of the evidence that any of the asserted claims were invalid and thus denied Supercell’s counterclaims of invalidity.

Supercell plans to appeal the decision.

We will continue to provide updates on lawsuits between GREE and Supercell.