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Google logo in France: intellectual property dispute
Photo: Charles Platiau / REUTERS
In the patent dispute between Google and the speaker provider Sonos, the Internet giant is retaliating after a lost round.
Google filed two new lawsuits accusing Sonos of infringing on seven other patents.
Among other things, this involves technologies that regulate how networked devices with language assistants deal with a wake-up word and wireless charging of batteries.
Sonos had prevailed in a patent process at the US Trade Commission ITC earlier this year.
This had consequences for the operation of Google's speakers.
For example, users of a group of several networked speakers have to change the volume for each of them individually instead of for all of them together.
In the new lawsuits, Google refers, among other things, to the fact that Sonos brought its own voice assistant to control music on its devices.
The Google Assistant has been available on Sonos speakers since 2019.
Sonos' chief legal officer, Eddie Lazarus, accused Google of using "intimidation tactics" in a statement on the "Protocol" website, among others.
Sonos was a pioneer in the use of networked speakers in different rooms of a household and is citing corresponding patents in the dispute.
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