Synopsys licenses its chip-design software and controls access with license keys. Sunlune Corporation, a chip-design company, held a license for only some Synopsys products. Synopsys alleged that Sunlune used counterfeit license keys to go beyond its license and to run products it had never licensed.
11,000 circumventions
Synopsys showed that Sunlune circumvented its access controls more than 11,000 times. The court had already barred Sunlune from using the software through a temporary restraining order and a preliminary injunction. Sunlune then failed to appear through counsel, and the court entered default.
What the court ordered
- $27.5 million in statutory damages under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, at the maximum rate of $2,500 per circumvention.
- A permanent injunction against any unauthorized access to Synopsys software.
The court dismissed the separate breach-of-contract claim without prejudice, so the award rests entirely on the circumvention of Synopsys’s access controls.
Why it matters
Under US law, every use of a counterfeit or cracked license key can be a separate violation. For heavily used engineering software, statutory damages can quickly exceed the price of every license the company would ever have needed.
Sources: Synopsys, Inc. v. Sunlune Corporation, N.D. Cal. No. 5:24-cv-00220, order of November 15, 2024; MLex report.
Header photo: Mister rf, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons (cropped and toned).
