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IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

FOR THE WESTERN DISTRICT OF TEXAS

WACO DIVISION

WSOU INVESTMENTS, LLC d/b/a 

BRAZOS LICENSING AND 

DEVELOPMENT,

Plaintiff,

v.

ZTE CORPORATION, ZTE (USA) 

INC., AND ZTE (TX), INC. 

Defendants.

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CIVIL ACTION NO. 6:20-cv-228

JURY TRIAL DEMANDED

ORIGINAL COMPLAINT FOR PATENT 

INFRINGEMENT

Plaintiff WSOU Investments, LLC d/b/a Brazos Licensing and Development (“Brazos” 

or “Plaintiff”), by and through its attorneys, files this Complaint for Patent Infringement against 

Defendants ZTE Corporation, ZTE (USA), Inc. and ZTE (TX), Inc. (collectively “ZTE” or 

“Defendants”) and alleges:

NATURE OF THE ACTION

1. This is a civil action for patent infringement arising under the Patent Laws of the 

United States, 35 U.S.C. §§ 1, et seq., including §§ 271, 281, 284, and 285.

THE PARTIES

2. Brazos is a limited liability corporation organized and existing under the laws of 

Delaware, with its principal place of business at 605 Austin Ave, Ste 6, Waco, TX 76701.

3. On information and belief, Defendant Zhongxing Telecommunications 

Equipment (abbreviated as “ZTE”) Corporation is a Chinese corporation that does business in 

Texas, directly or through intermediaries, with a principal place of business at ZTE Plaza, Keji 

Road South, Hi-Tech Industrial Park, Nanshan District, Shenzhen China.

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4. On information and belief, Defendant ZTE (USA) Inc. is a New Jersey 

corporation that does business in Texas, directly or through intermediaries, with a principal place 

of business in business in Richardson, Texas.

5. On information and belief, Defendant ZTE (TX) Inc. is a Texas corporation that 

does business in Texas, directly or through intermediaries, with a principal place of business in 

business in Austin, Texas.

6. All of the Defendants operate under and identify with the trade name “ZTE.” 

Each of the Defendants may be referred to individually as a “ZTE Defendant” and, collectively, 

Defendants may be referred to below as “ZTE” or as the “ZTE Defendants.”

JURISDICTION AND VENUE

7. This is an action for patent infringement which arises under the Patent Laws of 

the United States, in particular, 35 U.S.C. §§271, 281, 284, and 285.

8. This Court has jurisdiction over the subject matter of this action under 28 U.S.C.

§§ 1331 and 1338(a).

9. This Court has specific and general personal jurisdiction over each ZTE

Defendant pursuant to due process and/or the Texas Long Arm Statute, because each ZTE

Defendant has committed acts giving rise to this action within Texas and within this judicial 

district. The Court’s exercise of jurisdiction over each ZTE Defendant would not offend 

traditional notions of fair play and substantial justice because ZTE has established minimum 

contacts with the forum. For example, on information and belief, ZTE Defendants have 

committed acts of infringement in this judicial district, by among other things, selling and 

offering for sale products that infringe the asserted patent, directly or through intermediaries, as 

alleged herein.

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10. Venue in the Western District of Texas is proper pursuant to 28 U.S.C. §§1391

and/or 1400(b). The ZTE Defendants have committed acts of infringement and have places of 

businesses in this District and/or are foreign entities for purpose of §1391. As non-limiting 

examples, ZTE (TX) has maintained a place of business at 7000 N MO-PAC EXPRESSWAY 

200 AUSTIN, TX 7873; and, ZTE (USA) has maintained a place of business at 6500 River Place 

Blvd., Austin, TX 78730. ZTE Corporation also describes a “research-and-development center 

in Austin, Texas.”1

COUNT ONE - INFRINGEMENT OF 

U.S. PATENT NO. 8,179,960

11. Brazos re-alleges and incorporates by reference the preceding paragraphs of this 

Complaint.

12. On May 15, 2012, the United States Patent and Trademark Office duly and legally 

issued U.S. Patent No. 8,179,960 (“the ’960 Patent”), entitled “METHOD AND APPARATUS 

FOR PERFORMING VIDEO CODING AND DECODING WITH USE OF VIRTUAL 

REFERENCE DATA.” A true and correct copy of the ’960 Patent is attached as Exhibit A to 

this Complaint.

13. Brazos is the owner of all rights, title, and interest in and to the ’960 Patent, 

including the right to assert all causes of action arising under the ’960 Patent and the right to any 

remedies for the infringement of the ’960 Patent.

14. ZTE makes, uses, sells, offers for sale, imports, and/or distributes, in the United 

States, video display products, including phones (collectively, the “Accused Products”). 

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https://res-www.zte.com.cn/mediares/magazine/publication/tech_en/pdf/201009.pdf

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15. The Accused Products include Axon 10 Pro phones. 

https://www.zteusa.com/products/all-phones/axon-10-pro.html.

16. The Accused Products run the Android 10 operating system. In addition to “over 

the air” updates provided by ZTE, the ZTE (USA) website provides a software package and 

instructions for users to upgrade the existing operating system of the mobile devices to Android 

10. 

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. . .

https://www.zteusa.com/axon-10-pro. 

17. Codecs are used to generate an encoded video signal from an original video 

signal. Multiple video providers and browsers use codecs for streaming videos for display on 

mobile devices. The Android 10 operating system supports multiple videos and audio codecs, 

including AV1. AV1 is a video codec developed by Alliance for Open Media (AOM). It is related 

to the V9 and V8 codecs.

https://developer.android.com/about/versions/10/highlights.

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https://developers.google.com/media/vp9

https://bitmovin.com/av1/.

18. An original video signal contains several frames, and the resolution of the video 

signal specifies the width and height of these frames. The frame rate of a video signal informs 

about the number of images displayed per second. 

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https://developers.google.com/media/vp9/the-basics. 

19. A video codec reduces the size of an original video stream by encoding it to 

compress it. 

https://www.wowza.com/blog/video-codecs-encoding.

20. AV1 increases the number of reference frames to be used (e.g., from 3 in the case 

of VP9 to 7). The 'ALTREF', 'GOLDEN' and 'LAST' frames being the frames already present in 

the VP9 codec, AV1 codec generates two additional frames each from near past frames and 

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future frames. The 'ALTREF2' frame acts as an intermediate frame between 'GOLDEN' and 

'ALTREF'. The ALTREF and ALTREF2 contain the virtual reference data that is to be only used 

for the encoding purpose and does not contain any data that is to be displayed in the subsequent 

display of the video stream. The ALTREF frame can be a no-show reference obtained through 

temporal filtering.

https://jmvalin.ca/papers/AV1_tools.pdf (Page 2).

https://scl.ece.ucsb.edu/sites/default/files/publications/08416609.pdf (Page 1).

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21. VP8 utilizes three types of reference frames for inter prediction, namely: last 

frame, golden frame, and the alternate reference frame.

https://static.googleusercontent.com/media/research.google.com/en/us/pubs/archive/37073.pdf

(Page 2).

22. An Alternate Reference Frame can be generated by using multiple frames or 

different blocks from different video frames. Since the reference frame is created by a 

combination of several frames, it does not represent any portion of any individual frame. 

http://blog.webmproject.org/2010/05/inside-webm-technology-vp8-alternate.html. 

23. AV1 provides ALTREF2 frames in addition to VP9’s ALTREF (or alternate 

reference frame). ALTREF frames are temporal filtered future type reference frames. ALTREF2 

is an intermediate filtered future reference frame between GOLDEN and ALTREF frames. This 

shows that ALTREF2 does not represent any individual frame but comprises through temporal 

filtering and has a format between GOLDEN and ALTREF frames. In this manner, AV1 

generates ALTREF and ALTREF2 frames, which are then utilized for the encoding of the video 

stream.

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https://aomediacodec.github.io/av1-spec/av1-spec.pdf (Page 181-182)

https://aomediacodec.github.io/av1-spec/av1-spec.pdf (Page 182-183).

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24. AV1 performs the encoding of all the reference frames in order to efficiently 

encode the frames that are to be displayed utilizing already encoded reference frames. AV1 can 

use flags associated with the frames being updated.

https://aomedia.googlesource.com/aom/+/master/av1/encoder/encode_strategy.c.

25. The generated Alternate Reference Frame is encoded and incorporated with the 

encoded video signal. 

https://www.webmproject.org/docs/encoder-parameters/

26. Moreover, the reference frames are encoded and sent with the encoded video 

signals and used in decoding. 

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https://arxiv.org/pdf/1803.04061.pdf (Page 2).

https://www.webmproject.org/docs/container/.

27. AV1 incorporates the reference frames in the encoded video signal along with 

the marking of the type of reference frames. The type of reference frame is in itself an 

indication of whether the frame will be displayed in the output or not. AV1 allows the 

ALTREF frames to be utilized internally only and thus does not allow for them to be part of 

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the output. 

https://aomedia.googlesource.com/aom/+/master/av1/encoder/encoder.h/.

28. The 'ALTREF' frames are utilized for the encoding of other frames but are not to 

be displayed in the output of the video signal

https://scl.ece.ucsb.edu/sites/default/files/publications/08416609.pdf (Page 1).

29. The encoded video signal contains an indication of the alternate reference frame 

is included. The alternate reference frame is marked with an invisible flag, which informs the 

decoder that this frame does not represent any part of the individual frame to be displayed in the 

video display. 

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https://www.webmproject.org/docs/container/. 

30. A processor encodes frames of the original video signal by utilizing AV1 

reference frames at various bit rates. AV1 makes use of the extended number of reference frames 

to encode the original video stream efficiently. It includes both uni-directional (single) and bidirectional (compound) predictions.

https://jmvalin.ca/papers/AV1_tools.pdf (Page 2).

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https://nwgat.ninja/tag/av1/ (Page 1).

31. Alternate reference frames are utilized for encoding the frames that are to be 

displayed in the video stream. VP8 and subsequent related codecs, including AV1, achieve this 

through intelligent use of golden reference frames along with alternate reference frames.

https://static.googleusercontent.com/media/research.google.com/en/us/pubs/archive/37073.pdf

(Page 1).

32. The encoded portions of the video stream are included in the encoded video signal

and the decoder decodes the encoded video signal to display the video stream. The decoding 

order of AV1 involves decoding the reference frames first and then switching to the encoded 

frames that are to be displayed.

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https://arxiv.org/pdf/1803.04061.pdf (Page 1).

33. In view of preceding paragraphs, each and every element of at least claim 9 of the 

’960 Patent is found in the Accused Products.

34. ZTE has and continues to directly infringe at least one claim of the ’960 Patent, 

literally or under the doctrine of equivalents, by making, using, selling, offering for sale, 

importing, and/or distributing the Accused Products in the United States, including within this 

judicial district, without the authority of Brazos.

35. ZTE has received notice and actual or constructive knowledge of the ’960 Patent 

since at least the date of service of this Complaint.

36. Since at least the date of service of this Complaint, through its actions, ZTE has 

actively induced product makers, distributors, retailers, and/or end users of the Accused Products 

to infringe the ’960 Patent throughout the United States, including within this judicial district, 

by, among other things, advertising and promoting the use of the Accused Products in various 

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websites, including providing and disseminating product descriptions, operating manuals, and 

other instructions on how to implement and configure the Accused Products. Examples of such 

advertising, promoting, and/or instructing include the documents at:

• https://www.zteusa.com/axon-10-pro. 

37. Since at least the date of service of this Complaint, through its actions, ZTE has 

contributed to the infringement of the ’960 Patent by having others sell, offer for sale, or use the 

Accused Products throughout the United States, including within this judicial district, with

knowledge that the Accused Products infringe the ’960 Patent. The Accused Products are 

especially made or adapted for infringing the ’960 Patent and have no substantial non-infringing 

use. For example, in view of the preceding paragraphs, the Accused Products contain 

functionality which is material to at least one claim of the ’960 Patent.

JURY DEMAND

Brazos hereby demands a jury on all issues so triable.

REQUEST FOR RELIEF

WHEREFORE, Brazos respectfully requests that the Court:

(A) Enter judgment that ZTE infringes one or more claims of the ’960 Patent literally 

and/or under the doctrine of equivalents;

(B) Enter judgment that ZTE has induced infringement and continues to induce 

infringement of one or more claims of the ’960 Patent;

(C) Enter judgment that ZTE has contributed to and continues to contribute to the 

infringement of one or more claims of the ’960 Patent;

(D) Award Brazos damages, to be paid by ZTE in an amount adequate to compensate 

Brazos for such damages, together with pre-judgment and post-judgment interest for the 

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infringement by ZTE of the ’960 Patent through the date such judgment is entered in accordance 

with 35 U.S.C. §284, and increase such award by up to three times the amount found or assessed 

in accordance with 35 U.S.C. §284;

(E) Declare this case exceptional pursuant to 35 U.S.C. §285; and

(F) Award Brazos its costs, disbursements, attorneys’ fees, and such further and 

additional relief as is deemed appropriate by this Court.

Dated: March 26, 2020 Respectfully submitted,

/s/ James L. Etheridge

James L. Etheridge

Texas State Bar No. 24059147 

Ryan S. Loveless

Texas State Bar No. 24036997 

Travis L. Richins

Texas State Bar No. 24061296

ETHERIDGE LAW GROUP, PLLC

2600 E. Southlake Blvd., Suite 120 / 324

Southlake, Texas 76092

Telephone: (817) 470-7249

Facsimile: (817) 887-5950

Jim@EtheridgeLaw.com

Ryan@EtheridgeLaw.com

Travis@EtheridgeLaw.com

COUNSEL FOR PLAINTIFF

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