Finisar Corp. said it filed a patent infringement lawsuit against The DirecTV Group Inc. and related entities in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas. The suit alleges DirecTV has engaged and continues to engage in willful infringement of Finisar’s U.S. Patent No. 5,404,505 directed to a pioneering technology used to provide subscribers with access to contents of a large database while using a manageable amount of bandwidth. This technology is useful in a broad range of applications, including the transmission of electronic programming guides via satellite broadcast. The suit is seeking unspecified monetary damages from DirecTV as well as injunctive relief.