In May 2009, a jury awarded Creative Internet Advertising Corporation (CAIC) just over $6.6 million after finding Yahoo! Inc. willfully infringed a patent related to a background advertising system. Nine months later, a magistrate judge determined Yahoo’s willful violation of the patent warranted enhanced damages and prejudgment interest, bringing the total awarded damages to $12,462,291.

The patent-at-issue, USP 6,205,432, is entitled “Background advertising system.” The court found Yahoo! Inc.’s message system has a feature that allows users to add interactive backgrounds to instant message conversations, infringing CAIC’s patent both literally and under the doctrine of equivalents.

Creative Internet Advertising is a subsidiary of Acacia Research Corp.

Source(s):  “The Simon Law Firm announces enhanced damages for Creative Internet Advertising Corp. in suit against Yahoo!,” Businesswire.com, February 4, 2010 (http://eon.businesswire.com/portal/site/eon/permalink/?ndmViewId=news_view&newsId=20100204006210&newsLang=en).