Jury rules Arista did not infringe Cisco patent and owes no damages over Cisco's 2014 claim of copyright infringement
Dan Levine / Reuters :
Context & Ripple Effects
This verdict is one front in the two-year Cisco–Arista legal war over data-center switching. Cisco filed its infringement claims against Arista in 2014, and earlier this year the ITC handed Cisco its biggest win with an initial determination that Arista infringed three switching patents, while Arista responded with an antitrust countersuit alleging Cisco was abusing the legal system to slow a rival.
Today's jury ruling goes the other way: on the copyright and patent claims tried before this jury, Arista walks away owing nothing. The split outcome — losing at the ITC, winning with the jury — frames why both companies eventually chose to settle the whole dispute for $400 million in 2018.
First-order effects
- Arista exits this trial with no damages liability on Cisco's 2014 copyright-based claims, removing a direct financial threat while its switching business keeps selling into Cisco's core market.
- Cisco loses one of its two main legal levers: with the jury route closed, its remaining pressure point is the ITC case, where the final determination on the three infringed patents was still pending.
Second-order effects
- A mixed scoreboard raises the cost and uncertainty of continued litigation for both sides, pushing them toward the negotiated licensing resolution they ultimately reached with Arista's $400 million settlement and mutual withdrawal of claims.
- Arista's antitrust countersuit stays alive as bargaining leverage — a claim Cisco only shed when it took the settlement, suggesting the jury loss made Cisco's litigation position harder to sustain.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, high-stakes networking IP disputes resolve through settlement payments and cross-licensing rather than market-blocking injunctions, with the ITC serving as leverage rather than an endgame.
- For the switching market, litigation becomes a competitive weapon aimed at slowing a fast-growing rival — but juries willing to reject legacy vendors' claims cap how far that strategy can go.
The trend: Data-center networking competition is increasingly fought through patent and copyright litigation, with mixed court outcomes steering even bitter rivals like Cisco and Arista toward paid settlements over injunctions.