Enterprise technology leaders face an urgent but largely unrecognized threat to their network infrastructure. A patent infringement lawsuit filed in the Unified Patent Court could result in injunctions that could impact InfoBlox customers across key countries in Europe. The consequences may extend far beyond temporary inconvenience, potentially shutting down websites, disrupting internal operations, and severing API connections for some of the world’s largest corporations.
InfoBlox currently claims to serve over 75 percent of Fortune 500 companies with its comprehensive DDI platform, providing DNS, DHCP, and IP address management services that form the backbone of enterprise network communications. The scale of potential disruption becomes clear when considering that every internet communication within these organizations likely passes through InfoBlox DNS infrastructure. Yet most CIOs and technology leaders remain unaware that their critical network services could face mandatory shutdown orders in Germany, France, Finland, and potentially the United Kingdom.
The Hamburg Case and Its Implications
On January 30, 2026, patent holder Nixu FL IP Protection filed an infringement complaint in the Hamburg Local Division of the Unified Patent Court. The case centers on European Patent EP2005696, which covers an “Applianced domain name server”. The accused products include all InfoBlox systems running the company’s Network Identity Operating System (NIOS) and its advanced version NIOS-X.
The UPC provides a particularly powerful enforcement mechanism for patent holders. A single ruling can result in injunctions spanning multiple European Union member states simultaneously. Previous UPC cases have demonstrated the court’s willingness to issue preliminary injunctions that take effect rapidly, sometimes within weeks of filing. For InfoBlox customers operating across European markets, this means a favorable ruling for the patent holder could trigger immediate compliance requirements in multiple countries at once.
Erich Spangenberg, whose company acquired the FusionLayer patent portfolio involved in the case, stated that pre-litigation outreach attempts were unsuccessful. “We tried to engage on multiple occasions with InfoBlox and they refused to even speak with us,” Spangenberg said. “We attempted to contact the legal group and the CEO to no avail. There is still an opportunity, but the window closes quickly in the UPC.“
Recent Precedent Shows Real Business Impact
The threat of patent-based sales injunctions in European jurisdictions moved from theoretical to concrete reality earlier this month. On February 5, 2026, the Munich Regional Court ordered Renault to stop selling its Clio and Mégane models in Germany following a patent dispute with Broadcom. The court found that Renault lacked proper licensing for ethernet network cable connections used in the vehicles’ navigation and telematics systems.
The Renault case demonstrates how quickly patent enforcement can disrupt major corporate operations. The court ordered not only a halt to sales but also the recall and destruction of infringing products already in the market. While the ruling does not take effect until Broadcom posts a multi-million euro deposit, legal analysts note that such enforcement mechanisms are standard procedure in German patent courts.
The automotive industry case provides a clear parallel for technology infrastructure providers and their customers. Just as Renault’s business operations in Germany face immediate shutdown over components sourced from suppliers, InfoBlox customers could face similar restrictions on using network infrastructure they depend on for daily operations. The difference is that DNS systems are even more fundamental to business continuity than vehicle sales.
Understanding DNS Infrastructure Vulnerabilities
DNS infrastructure failures create cascading problems across entire organizations. When DNS services go offline, websites become unreachable, internal applications stop functioning, and cloud-based systems lose connectivity. E-commerce platforms experience direct revenue loss with every minute of downtime, while SaaS providers face service-level agreement penalties and potential customer cancellations.
Recent DNS outages affecting major cloud providers have shown that even sophisticated infrastructure with geographic redundancy can fail catastrophically. A widespread AWS disruption in late 2025 took countless services offline for hours, demonstrating that internal redundancy becomes irrelevant when a provider’s core DNS management system fails. The entire platform becomes a single point of failure.
Enterprise technology leaders have traditionally approached DNS infrastructure as a solved problem, relying on established vendors with strong market positions. InfoBlox’s dominant market share of over 50 percent in the DDI networking market reflects this confidence. The company serves more than 13,000 customers worldwide across financial services, healthcare, manufacturing, and retail sectors.
However, patent disputes introduce a different category of risk that technical redundancy cannot address. An injunction targeting InfoBlox products could require customers to cease using the systems regardless of backup configurations or failover mechanisms. The legal requirement to stop using infringing technology applies equally to primary systems and redundant backups that utilize the same underlying platform. It is unclear if a workaround or some other solution could be implemented, but the sheer scale of the problem indicates that even this may not be simple to implement.
Supply Chain Liability in Network Infrastructure
The InfoBlox case raises broader questions about supply chain liability in enterprise technology procurement. Major corporations invest heavily in vendor risk assessments that evaluate financial stability, security practices, and operational resilience. Yet few organizations systematically evaluate the patent litigation exposure of their infrastructure vendors or assess the potential impact of injunctions on their own operations.
The FusionLayer patents at issue in the Hamburg case originated with Finnish inventors who developed innovations in cloud computing, virtual networking, and IP address management. According to sources that had reviewed communications between FusionLayer and Infoblox, InfoBlox and its majority owner conducted due diligence on FusionLayer while evaluating a potential acquisition. The acquisition never materialized, but technologies covered by FusionLayer patents are alleged to exist in InfoBlox products. This fact pattern is common in technology patent disputes. From a customer perspective, the merits of such disputes matter less than the operational impact of potential injunctions.
What Enterprise Customers Should Do Now
Technology leaders using InfoBlox systems in European operations should immediately assess their exposure to potential service disruptions. Organizations with significant operations in Germany, France, Finland, or the United Kingdom face the highest immediate risk given the jurisdictions specified in the Hamburg complaint. However, the UPC’s broad enforcement powers mean that rulings could potentially extend to additional member states.
Prudent risk management requires evaluating alternative DNS infrastructure options that could be deployed rapidly if injunctions take effect. While InfoBlox has made recent investments in its Universal DDI platform to simplify hybrid and multi-cloud operations, these enhancements do not address patent-related legal risks. The company’s integration partnerships with Microsoft, Google Cloud, Akamai, and Cloudflare provide operational benefits but would not protect customers from compliance requirements if an injunction orders cessation of InfoBlox product usage.
Organizations should review their contracts with InfoBlox to understand what protections, if any, exist for service disruptions caused by third-party legal actions. Standard enterprise software agreements typically disclaim vendor liability for injunctions or other legal actions that prevent product usage. Customers facing potential operational shutdowns may find they have limited contractual recourse against their infrastructure provider.
The timeline for potential injunctions remains uncertain. UPC cases can move quickly, with some preliminary injunctions issued within weeks of filing. However, full proceedings typically take longer, and settlement negotiations often conclude patent disputes before injunctions take effect. InfoBlox customers should monitor developments in the Hamburg case while preparing contingency plans for rapid DNS infrastructure migration if necessary.
The broader lesson extends beyond this specific case. As patent enforcement mechanisms strengthen across European jurisdictions, enterprise technology leaders must expand their vendor risk frameworks to include intellectual property disputes. The operational resilience that matters most may increasingly depend not on technical redundancy but on the legal standing of the technologies that critical infrastructure depends upon.
