The legal battle between ZeniMax Media and Oculus VR has a verdict from the jury. In the first of many questions put to the jury, they decided Oculus did not misappropriate trade secrets.
The jury, however, also decided that Oculus co-founder Palmer Luckey failed to comply with a non-disclosure agreement he signed, as did Oculus by extension. They awarded ZeniMax $500 million as a result.
This story is developing. Updates to come…
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Here is some background on the case:
ZeniMax first accused Oculus of theft of its technology shortly after the announcement that Facebook was to acquire the startup back in 2014 for $2 billion (now thought to be $3 billion). It claimed that the Oculus Rift VR headset was built using its own technology and that John Carmack, the legendary game developer formerly of ZeniMax-owned id Software, had used its resources to offer essential help in developing the Rift.
Carmack does have ties to the Rift dating back to 2012, when creator Palmer Luckey sent him an early prototype that Carmack would demonstrate at that year’s E3 running id-made Doom 3: BFG Edition. The help Carmack offered Oculus during this time and the dispute of what code was made available to Oculus made up much of the trial.
The verdict comes after a trial that saw figureheads at Facebook, Oculus, and ZeniMax take the stand. Most notably, Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Facebook, answered questions. He stated that “Oculus products are based on Oculus technology.”
We also saw the emergence of Luckey, around four months after he fell off the radar following the revelation he had helped fund a political propaganda campaign. Luckey was insistent that he had built the Rift on his own, despite claims from ZeniMax that he lacked the knowledge to do so. Former Oculus CEO Brendan Iribe also gave his account of the origins of the company, and Carmack himself took to the stand to defend himself.
Garrett Glass is a freelance writer based in Texas. He spent the last few weeks following the case for UploadVR.
Tagged with: court case, zenimax
