Cupertino’s seemingly neverending legal battle with patent troll VirnetX Holding Corp. took another turn this week when the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit denied Apple’s request to reconsider an original patent-infringement decision.

VirnetX and Apple have been fighting in courts for a decade over patents related to FaceTime and other secure communications. VirnetX, which doesn’t produce any products, previously won more than $503 million in damages, but courts subsequently threw out the award.

Apple has been ordered by a California jury to pay $837.7 million in damages for breaching Wi-Fi technology patents owned by the California Institute of Technology. 

Apple says it plans to appeal the verdict.

Apple is among the companies which want to stop so-called patent trolls from stifling innovation with their claims.

A patent troll, for those unfamiliar with it, is a person or company that holds patent portfolios but does not actually make any products. Instead, they earn their money by licensing out the technology — or suing companies which use it unlawfully. And Apple and 34 other multinationals — including Microsoft and BMW — are none-too-happy about them.

Apple won a round in court against VirnetX, a company often accused of being patent troll. An appeals court threw out $503 million award that the iPhone maker was ordered to pay in an earlier ruling.

However, the court didn’t reverse the original patent-infringement decision, just the amount of the award.

Apple and Intel have filed an antitrust lawsuit against Fortress Investment Group, claiming that the investment management group is stockpiling patents. It then allegedly uses these patents to demand as much as $5.1 billion in lawsuits filed against tech firms.

Both Apple and Intel are accusing the firm of stockpiling patents, despite it not actually making any tech products. They claim this is in violation of United States antitrust laws.

Brydge today pre-announced a clip-on iPad Pro keyboard that incorporates a trackpad, something that only became possible with the just-released iPadOS 13. This would create a computer like a MacBook with a removable touchscreen.

It’s not the first such accessory to be unveiled, but Brydge is bringing a patent-infringement lawsuit against a company that last month launched a Kickstarter campaign for a similar iPad keyboard case with trackpad.

Apple chipmaker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) is counter-suing smaller chipmaking rival GlobalFoundries in the U.S., Germany, and Singapore. TSMC says that GlobalFoundries infringed on 25 of its patents.

TSMC is the world’s largest contact chipmaker. It creates the A-series chips used in Apple devices, such as the iPhone 11’s A13 processor. It is looking for “substantial monetary damages” from GlobalFoundries.

Apple was granted the equivalent of almost six patents per day in 2018, racking up more than 2,000 over the year.

The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office ranks Apple No. 11 on a list of companies awarded the greatest number of patents. So, who beat Apple at the patent game in 2018?

Apple wants another shot at beating so called patent troll VirnetX in court.

The Cupertino company was previously ordered to pay $439 million for infringing on two of VirnetX’s patents with its FaceTime technology. However, an appeals court has since found many of VirnetX’s patents to be unpatentable.

A mega-lawsuit from a so-called patent troll claims that Apple is infringing on 16 separate patents.

The lawsuit was filed in the Eastern District of Texas by Seven Networks, a software company which licenses technology related to network congestion and other areas.