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NTP Sues Palm, Alleging Patent Violation
Posted by
Zonk
on Tue Nov 07, 2006 09:45 AM
from the thrilling dept.
from the thrilling dept.
mikesd81 writes "The Seattle Time reports that NTP is now going after Palm for patent infringement on technology used in their devices. The suit asks the court to bar Palm from continuing to infringe on NTP's patents and seeks monetary damages for the alleged past infringements. At issues are eleven patents, dating from 1995 to 2001, according to the lawsuit. Five of the patents were part of NTP's lawsuit against RIM. The Palm complaint also centers on products, services and systems that integrate e-mail systems with wireless communications, including the Treo, Palm VII, Palm i700 and Tungsten products." You may recall NTP from the just-finished Blackberry case. Good to know they're staying busy.
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RIM Settles Long-Standing Blackberry Claim 295 comments
David Jao writes "Research in Motion has agreed to pay 612.5 million dollars for a 'full and final settlement of all claims' resulting from the NTP patent lawsuit against the makers of BlackBerry. According to the article, the settlement is 'on the low end of expectations', perhaps because the patents in question had earlier been preliminarily ruled invalid by the US Patents & Trademarks Office." Many article submitters characterize this move as 'giving in' to NTP's tactics. What do you think?
[+]
NTP Gets a Taste of Its Own Medicine 49 comments
UltraAyla writes, "NTP's patent suits seem to have attracted the attention of Oren Tavory, a man who claims to have worked on a project with NTP founder Thomas Campana back in 1991. From the article: 'In September, Tavory filed a lawsuit against NTP in U.S. District Court in Richmond, VA, demanding that a judge issue a court order naming him as co-inventor on seven NTP patents, and accusing NTP of copyright infringement and unjust enrichment.'"
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If you don't manufacture anything... (Score:4, Informative)
Re:If you don't manufacture anything... (Score:5, Interesting)
Actually not. While they did settle with Blackberry for a healthy sum, shortly after the settlement agreement, all 7 of NTP's patents were found to be invalid by the USPTO.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Solution: Don't Establish US Offices (Score:3, Interesting)
I see the solution to the US patent roulette as simple: Don't establish a US office. Force all customers to contract with a head office in a nation that has SANE laws that aren't sold to the highest bidder. Force them to deal with fair courts, and cut t
Except... (Score:3, Informative)
Even if your offices are out of the US, US courts still have the jurisdiction to shut down your operations in the US.
That's why I set my clock manually... (Score:4, Funny)
Although I have two palms (and two hands, two arms, etc), I don't like the fact that the Network Time Protocol has suddenly gone through the Intarweb tubes to the lawyers and is taking legal action against parts of my body.
What's next? HTTP suing my big toe? Telnet suing my liver? When will it all end?!? Ohh the humanity...
TDz.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
eBlackMail (Score:5, Insightful)
And when the cops won't stop them, they're unstoppable.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
NTP (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Sadly their products are lawsuits.
Pity there isn't a way to boycott those
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
To expand on what others have already said:
NTP is a classic example of a patent troll [wikipedia.org]. They purchase patents from other companies and then sue people for violations of those patents, and try to get people to pay them protection
Only the even ones? (Score:4, Funny)
The even ones? How many is that?
Re: (Score:2)
Dear NTP (Score:2, Insightful)
Please eat excrement and die.
Re:Dear NTP (Score:4, Funny)
Thanks!
Remember, kids (Score:2)
If I beleived in God (Score:2)
Palm's Response (Score:5, Informative)
The NTP lawsuit claims that certain Palm products infringe seven NTP patents. All seven of the patents asserted are being re-examined by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) and have been rejected by the re-examiners as invalid. Palm also noted that the NTP patents disclose a pager-based email service that has nothing in common with the mobile-computing devices invented by Palm. Palm has been in occasional contact with NTP concerning a license to these patents. When Palm last communicated with NTP many months ago, however, each of the patents already was the subject of re-examination proceedings by the PTO. Palm is disappointed that, after many months of silence and repeated rejections of NTP's claims by the PTO, NTP has chosen to sue on patents of doubtful validity. Palm respects legitimate intellectual property rights, but will defend itself vigorously against the attempted misuse of the patent and judicial systems to extract monetary value for rights to patents that may ultimately have no value at all.
Great, Another Lawsuit (Score:5, Funny)
Re:It is all wrong... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
The patent itself is rediculous and a perfect example of why software patents must go. You have a PC-like device cap
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:huh? (Score:5, Funny)
NTP just thought the time seemed right.