Court Orders Markforged to Pay $17M to Continuous Composites

It seems a major ongoing intellectual property saga in the 3D printing world may be coming to an end. A jury in the U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware has reached a verdict in a patent lawsuit first made by Continuous Composite back in 2021. As a result, Markforged has been demanded to pay Continuous Composites about $17.3 million in compensation.

Both Markforged and Continuous Composites are well-known for their composite 3D printing solutions. Notably, they both employ what is known as “continuous” composite printing. In this, extrusion is used but unlike many composite filaments where chopped fibers, less than a millimeter in length, are mixed into thermoplastics to increase stiffness, composite fibers are deposited in the conventional parts at the same time using a second nozzle. In the case, the jury was asked to decide whether the patent of Continuous Composites had been infringed upon, while Markforged claimed that it had invented the technology first.

The patent infringement case was first brought against Markforged by Continuous Composites in July 2021 (photo credits: Continuous Composites)

The Verdict in Markforged vs. Continuous Composites

There have been a few updates prior to this unanimous verdict. Notably, although Continuous Composites had filed a lawsuit asserting patent infringement for more patents, a decision in April 2023 eliminated four of the patents as they found that Markforged has not infringed on them, accounting for about 20 claims. This verdict was thus founded on only on single patent 11,173,660.