A Texas federal judge's Tuesday ruling, in the much-prolonged legal patent infringement lawsuit by set-top box maker TiVo Inc against the satellite TV provider EchoStar Communications Corp, has gone TiVo's way!

Rejecting EchStar's efforts of a "work-around" claim pertaining to the contented patent for digital video recorder technology, the U. S. District Judge David Folsom awarded TiVo $103 million, over and above the $105 million that EchoStar - now a part of Dish Network Corp - has already paid TiVo, as well as interest through April 2008.

Finding EchoStar to be in contempt of court, the ruling also included the full enforcement of a previously-lifted permanent injunction by EchoStar. In fact, the judge is likely to impose further damages later this summer, due to EchoStar's violation of an injunction imposed by a jury verdict, and its supposed implementation of a new "work-around" technology, which TiVo asserts was still an infringement of the patent.

The TiVo-EchoStar legal spat began in 2004, when TiVo alleged that EchoStar's Dish network system had violated TiVo's patent for "Time Warp" software, which enables users to record one TV program, alongside watching another program.

Talking about the court ruling, TiVo CEO Tom Rogers told Reuters that the verdict not only "demonstrates the value of our intellectual property," but also points to "major ramifications for infringing."