Story highlights Jury finds chipmaker infringed on university's patents

Carnegie Mellon hails verdict

Company denied claim

A federal jury in Pennsylvania on Wednesday ordered Marvell Technology Group, Ltd., to pay $1.17 billion in damages after finding it infringed on two patents held by Carnegie Mellon University.

A lawsuit filed in 2009 by the Pittsburgh university claimed that Marvell infringed on its patented technology fundamental for "increasing the accuracy with which hard disk drive circuits read data from high-speed magnetic disks," according to a press release from K&L Gates, the law firm representing Carnegie Mellon.

The damages could be increased by as much as three times by U.S. District Court judge Nora Barry Fischer since the jury found chipmaker Marvell's infringements were willful, according to K&L Gates.

The jury also found Marvell sold billions of chips incorporating the university's technology without a license to do so, according to K&L Gates.

Marvell has denied the claim.

It did not immediately reply to messages left Wednesday by CNN.

In a statement, Carnegie Mellon said, "We felt the evidence we submitted was compelling, and the jury agreed. Protection of the discoveries of our faculty and students is very important to us."