GameChange Solar, a subsidiary of US energy infrastructure company GameChange Energy, has filed a patent infringement lawsuit against US solar solutions provider Nextpower in the US District Court for the District of Delaware.
GameChange alleges that Nextpower’s products infringe on US Patent 12,449,161, which is owned by GameChange Solar and covers solar tracking systems that can rotate 60-80 degrees from a horizonal plane when the array is exposed to winds of more than 70mph. GameChange Solar filed for the patent in September 2020, and the patent was assigned to the company in October 2025, with GameChange founder Andrew Barron Worden and chief engineer Scott Van Pelt named as the inventors of the technology.
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While GameChange did not specify which Nextpower trackers are in violation of this patent—saying only that the company’s “products infringe on one or more claims of this patent”—it said that it is seeking injunctive relief and monetary damages as part of the lawsuit.
“We take our intellectual property seriously, and we will act to defend the innovations that set our products apart,” said GameChange CEO Phillip Vyhanek.
Details are sparse on the case—GameChange has not commented on the case beyond the initial press release and Nextpower is yet to issue a statement—but PV Tech has asked both companies for further details on the case.
The lawsuit mirrors Nextpower’s suing of GameChange over three separate alleged violations of the former’s patents. At the time, Nextpower CEO and founder Dan Shugar said that “we respect legitimate competition, but we will vigorously defend our patent rights in all global markets in which we conduct business”.
That case was also filed with the US District Court for the District of Delaware in June, and coincided with GameChange’s consolidation of its solar, transformer and electrical BOS (eBOS) divisions into a single brand.
Both companies have rebranded in the last year to reflect a shift away from tracker manufacturing and towards a more vertically integrated approach to providing energy services. Last month, GameChange started construction work on a transformer manufacturing facility in India and last year Nextpower moved on from its old name of ‘Nextracker’ to become, in its words, a “full-platform” provider of energy solutions.
The US solar industry has seen a wave of ‘lawfare’ in recent months, primarily focusing on tunnel oxide passivated contact (TOPCon) cell technology. The escalating lawsuits between GameChange and Nextpower are evidence of similar legal battles affecting other parts of the solar sector, where patent litigation is being used as a tactical measure in an increasingly competitive commercial environment.
