On September 17, 2026, Lenovo filed a motion for voluntary dismissal with no right to refile in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, thereby voluntarily withdrawing its patent infringement lawsuit against Asus regarding laptop computers. The motion made no mention of a settlement, but court records from July related to the case before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit indicated that the two parties were engaged in negotiations at the time.
The case originated from lawsuits filed by Lenovo’s U.S. subsidiary against ASUS in November 2023 in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California and at the ITC. The patents asserted in both cases overlapped and involved technologies such as diagonal scrolling on touchpads and hinges that allow laptops to fold into tablet form.
The California lawsuit was stayed in January 2024 by District Judge Beth Labson Freeman pending the ITC investigation. In June 2025, the ITC issued a final ruling in favor of ASUS, finding that the asserted patent claims were neither infringed nor valid. It is worth noting that the ITC’s validity ruling applies only to the specific case and does not result in the revocation of the patent.
Lenovo subsequently filed an appeal with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, and both parties submitted their initial briefs. In mid-July, the court agreed to extend the deadline for reply briefs and noted in the court record that the parties were engaged in settlement negotiations. In August, both parties dismissed their appeals; subsequently, the California lawsuit was also dismissed.
As of last Friday, Law360 reported that representatives from both Lenovo and ASUS had not immediately responded to requests for comment nor confirmed whether a settlement had been reached.
IP Finance will continue to monitor further developments.
Case Background
In August 2023, ASUS filed a lawsuit in the Munich Regional Court alleging that Lenovo had infringed upon several of its 5G standard-essential patents;
On November 15, 2023, Lenovo launched a full-scale counterattack in the U.S., filing a 337 investigation complaint with the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC) and initiating parallel litigation in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, alleging that ASUS’s ZenBook Pro and ZenBook Flip 14 laptops infringed on multiple patents related to wireless communication and diagonal touchpad technology;
In January 2024, Judge Beth Labson Freeman of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California ruled to stay the infringement lawsuit pending the outcome of the ITC investigation;
In June 2024, Lenovo filed a patent infringement complaint against ASUS at the Munich Regional Division of the Unified Patent Court (UPC), involving patent EP3682587. Subsequently, Innovative Sonic Corporation (ISC), an affiliate of ASUS, also sued Lenovo at the Düsseldorf Division of the UPC, alleging infringement of standard-essential patents.
On February 5, 2025, an ITC administrative law judge issued a final preliminary determination, finding that ASUS did not infringe the patent claims asserted by Lenovo, or that the relevant claims were invalid.
On June 20, 2025, the ITC issued a final determination upholding the administrative law judge’s preliminary determination, finding that ASUS did not violate Section 337 of the U.S. Tariff Act of 1930 and declining to issue an exclusion order against the products in question;
In June 2026, both parties jointly filed a motion with the UPC to stay the patent infringement and invalidity proceedings; at the same time, a case management conference originally scheduled to be held in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California was canceled, indicating that both parties had suspended the relevant litigation proceedings;
On August 11, 2026, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit ruled to dismiss the appeal proceedings in accordance with the agreement between the parties;
On September 17, 2026, Lenovo filed a motion for voluntary dismissal with no right to refile with the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, formally concluding the California litigation.
