USAA, Truist Settle Mobile Deposit Patent-Infringement Case

USAA and Truist reached a settlement and patent license agreement that resolves the lawsuit between them, according to a USAA press release and a court document filed Thursday.

Financial details of the deal are not public.

“USAA remains willing to enter into mutually beneficial licensing arrangements with all banks and credit unions, regardless of their situations,” Nathan McKinley, vice president and head of corporate development for the San Antonio-based insurance and financial services company, said in the release.

A spokesperson for Truist told Reuters the bank was happy to have the matter resolved.

USAA sued Truist in July 2022, claiming the bank was infringing on three patents related to mobile deposit capture. But Truist is hardly the first bank with which USAA has locked horns over that technology.

USAA won two nine-figure judgments in 2019 and 2020 against Wells Fargo, totaling more than $300 million, as a result of mobile check deposit patent-infringement disputes.

A judge ordered PNC in May 2022 to pay USAA $218.5 million in a patent-infringement case. But after the Pittsburgh-based bank requested a review of USAA’s patents that were subject in the trial, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office’s Patent Trial and Appeal Board sided with PNC, ruling that three of USAA’s patents on mobile check deposit technology are invalid, according to Law360.

More recently, USAA signed an agreement with Discover Financial Services giving the card network access to more than 130 USAA patents.

USAA sent letters to 100 banks in 2017, warning them they were violating the mobile deposit patents.

The patents themselves have been a source of contention over the past 15 years. USAA, which caters to U.S. military service members and their families, began collaborating with identity verification software firm Mitek in the early 2000s on remote deposit capture technology. The two companies, however, had a falling out, described at the time as a contract dispute.

The two firms separately launched similar mobile deposit capture products — first Mitek in February 2008, then USAA in August 2009.

After a series of legal battles over the rights and licensing of the technology, the companies settled in 2014. Both kept their patents.

“USAA is proud of our record of innovation, including remote deposit capture technology that has made banking easier for our members,” McKinley said in Thursday’s release.

Truist, during the case, denied the patent-infringement allegations and suggested that USAA infringed its own mobile-deposit patents.