LOS ANGELES, U.S. – Touch Coffee & Beverages, LLC (Touch) has filed a motion for preliminary injunction against Keurig Green Mountain, Inc.* (Keurig) (NASDAQ: GMCR) for patent infringement, explaining that Touch’s four U.S. Patents: (1) US 9,144,343; (2) US 9,149,149; (3) US 9,149,150; and (4) US 9,149,151 cover the Keurig 2.0 series of brewers including K200, K300, K400, and K500.
In 2015, Touch released a single-serve coffee platform with its new brewers focused on delivering a hotter cup of coffee from K-Cup® pods.
Additionally, Touch developed XBold Cupsâ„¢ and XLarge Cupsâ„¢ to conveniently brew coffee shop quality coffee with the push of one button at home or at the office. Touch offers three in-home brewers and one in-office brewer designed to brew hotter, stronger, bigger, and faster cups of coffee and address common problems of existing brewers in the market.
Compared to most K-Cups, which pack about 11.5 grams of coffee, Touch’s patent pending XBold Cups and XLarge Cups incorporate the latest filter/pod design to pack up to 15 and 18 grams of coffee, respectively.
To accommodate two different styles of single-serve cups (K-Cup pods and XBold Cups as well as the taller XLarge Cups), Touch’s brewers incorporate one inlet needle to inject hot water and two outlet needles to pierce two different styles of cups and drain the beverage from their respective cups.
Touch’s patents generally cover the use of a single-serve brewing system with a single inlet needle and multiple different outlet needles. Keurig has since also introduced the one inlet/two-outlet needles concept in its Keurig 2.0 series of brewers to accommodate different-sized beverage pods, such as its K-Cup, K-Carafe™, and K-Mug™ pods.
*Disclaimer; Touch Coffee & Beverages, LLC is NOT affiliated with Keurig Green Mountain, Inc. Keurig® and K-Cup® are registered trademarks of Keurig Green Mountain, Inc.
