RIM Facing $147.2 Million Patent Verdict 77
An anonymous reader writes "Reuters reports that beleaguered wireless device maker Research In Motion is on the losing end of a patent suit that will cost them $147.2 million. The jury arrived at that number by assigning an $8 royalty for every BlackBerry connected to RIM's enterprise server software. Unsurprisingly, RIM intends to appeal the decision. 'Mformation sued RIM in 2008, bringing claims on a patent for a process that remotely manages a wireless device over a wireless network, a court filing says. According to its web site, Mformation helps corporations manage their smart phone inventory. The company also says it helps telecoms operators, such as AT&T and Sprint, with remote fixes and upgrades for users' gadgets. RIM argued that Mformation's patent claims are invalid because the processes were already being used when Mformation filed its patent application.'"
New strategy (Score:5, Funny)
RIM's lawyers have asked if they can pay the penalty based on current usage. That would bring the verdict down to $72.
kick them while they're down (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:kick them while they're down (Score:5, Informative)
RIM has $2b in cash and is doing well in some offbeat markets like Indonesia. They have problems but they aren't likely to go broke.
Re:kick them while they're down (Score:5, Insightful)
Shh... You're not supposed to contradict the popular consensus that RIM is $80B in debt, went bankrupt 6 months ago, and plans to sell half the company next week, and liquidate the rest by the end of the month.
I think you're also supposed to throw in some collection of jabs against whatever phone they sold 4-5 years ago that you didn't like, and how they're still selling it as part of their current portfolio and not working on anything newer.
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The judgement becomes a claimant in the bankruptcy.
Say a company has $3b in assets, $2b in debts and loses a $4b suit. They go into bankruptcy. During the bankruptcy they lose $200m in senior debt.
The company then is restructured one of two ways:
a) The plaintiff gets 66% (3b in assets / $4b suit) of the stock of a company with $3b in assets and $200b in debt
b) The plaintiff gets 66% of the $2.8b after liquidation
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Re:kick them while they're down (Score:4, Insightful)
Gross profits for the last year is $6.5b
That gives them EBITDA of $2.4b
after all the write downs they lost $50m
And btw those write downs include settlements on the employees they laid off. That's not great it is not however a company dying quickly on the verge of bankruptcy. It is a company working through issues. Lets not overstate the problems.
The market is very concerned about their execution and with good reason. That's far short of bankruptcy though. As an aside any stock trading for a 1/3rd of book with only product problems, I'd happily buy and take my chances.
Prior art no longer valid? (Score:2, Insightful)
So, even if there is prior art, now that is a worthless argument against a patent?
If so, then the American tech industry is completely screwed. I LIKE IT!
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Not to mention it wouldn't take someone skilled in the art to see managing wireless devices would more than likely be done ... drumroll ... wirelessly!
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Judges -- for better or worse -- cannot invalidate patents. They can only rule on whether company X has infringed on the patent as it stands. It is up to company X to make a separate challenge to the validity of the patent through the Patent Office.
Of course, prior art also seems to be ignored during the patent approval process. Patent System: fucked from A to Z.
Of course it is (Score:3)
So, even if there is prior art, now that is a worthless argument against a patent?
If so, then the American tech industry is completely screwed. I LIKE IT!
A patent is invalid if there is one or more pieces of prior art, existent at the time of filing, that, alone or in combination, disclose, teach, or suggest, explicitly or inherently, each and every element of the claims. There's been a lot of FUD spread about the patent reform act and moving from first-to-invent to first-to-file. It changes nothing about prior art, novelty, and obviousness.
In this case, RIM claimed there was prior art that anticipated the patent, but the jury disagreed. That doesn't chan
Obvious is obvious (Score:5, Interesting)
claims on a patent for a process that remotely manages a wireless device over a wireless network
How else are you going to manage a wireless device? If this isn't a ridiculous patent there is none.
Re:Obvious is obvious (Score:5, Informative)
Then it doesn't matter that everyone skilled in this field would solve the problem similarly
Yes, it absolutely does matter. If the solution is obvious to "a person having ordinary skill in the art" [wikipedia.org] then it's not patentable. I'm pretty sure that any reasonably skilled engineer who needs a way to manage wireless devices would manage them over a wireless network.
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Obvious (as I understand it) means that I would have solved the same problem in the same way, no matter how much work it took
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looks like patent # 6,970,917 (Score:1)
which looks legit. figure it was awarded in the early part of the last decade with a 3-4 year time for the patent office to process the application. looks like a legit patent for work being done years before BES became popular and when RIM was still selling texting toys to teenagers
Re:looks like patent # 6,970,917 (Score:4, Insightful)
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And, due to the unreliability of ye olde networks, we did it ten years before that with email. Store and forward is not a new idea.
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Exactly. That's how UUCP mail worked. Store & forward between the modem-connected nodes then over the internet to the destination MX.
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I'm fairly sure that at least some of my dialup calls in the '80s went over a microwave link.
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If we forget Blackberry, there were a lot of devices around that were connected by switched telephone lines that could only get their updates when connected. Not all that different from wireless.
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BEFORE BES became popular you're suggesting that RIM was selling texting toys to teenagers?
Blackberry was a corporate phone long before it took off with teens. They cost a fortune in the early days, and were an executive status symbol. In the US at least in that era it wasn't super-common for teenagers to even have phones, though some did have them. We're talking 1990s here...
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Shhh, this is Slashdot. If a company did two things at any point in its history they are obviously contemporaneous and can be used together to attack/defend any point one makes.
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Not a single part of that patent, alone or in conjunction with any/all other parts, is novel or non-obvious. It is how devices were managed before, the only difference being they were connected to a cord. Deploying a wireless network would obviate the need for a cord, and the next step is to perform that management over the wireless data link on the device.
Now, perhaps if they had patented the idea of putting a wireless link into a device for the purpose of managing it, and submitted that patent a decade ea
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More than likely a result of bandwidth considerations, but without being privy to their internal deliberations I have no idea.
Regardless of the specifics of one company's choices, the evolution was inevitable, barring some radical shift in new technology which would have supplanted the progression of available wireless bandwidth.
Poor RIM (Score:1)
Re:Poor RIM (Score:5, Insightful)
They forgot to pay somebody. It reminds me of the old movie "Back to School" where Rodney Dangerfield is taking a business class and he starts filling the instructor in on all the payoffs and bribes necessary to conduct business in the "real" world.
They reap what they sow (Score:2, Flamebait)
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I should have mentioned that as well because it furthers my point.
No, it doesn't.
their suit over "push e-mail" was the counter-suit. it even mentions that in the article you linked to. (last paragraph)
The two companies are still involved in a patent dispute in Texas. Visto sued RIM for patent infringement, prompting a countersuit from the BlackBerry maker.
prior art? (Score:1)
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I think RIM's whole point was that the Backberry WAS prior art. I wish there were a link to the actual rulings...
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If there was valid prior art, do you not think RIM's lawyers would have looked for it and used it ?
These patent cases tend to be very technically complex and turn on very fine details of exact wording. Armchair lawyer's commenting in these threads should probably stick to their day jobs.
Even their viral Twitter ad backfired (Score:1)
Ouch. [latimes.com]
My Blackberry (Score:3, Informative)
I own a Blackberry phone, it's the easiest phone I can use SINGLE-HANDED and perform tasks that otherwise would require screen flipping using other smart phones. The Blackberry is not a tablet nor does it claim to be, it is a phone designed to be tough, functional and very reliable when you need it.
Here's a simple and old feature of my Blackberry, I can set an alarm for 7AM, turn off my phone completely, go to sleep, it will turn on at 7AM and sign the alarm. I cannot tell you how many times I've been in situations where I didn't have a battery charger and needed all the battery power I could get and needed to be awaken in the morning.
The shape of the Blackberry is very ergonomic, fits perfect in anyone's palm, I can do everything (short of typing a long message) single-handed, try doing that with those over-sized devices. The Blackberry one of the few devices left for true mobility.
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I always laugh when I see this, because the mental response that comes to mind is always "You 12?"
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I cannot tell you how many times I've been in situations where I didn't have a battery charger and needed all the battery power I could get and needed to be awaken in the morning.
The above indicates nothing so much as your own lack of preparation.
It is trivially easy to have chargers in one's home, car, workplace, and briefcase.
The above indicates nothing so much as your own lack of imagination.
HINT: i don't carry a portable power-point.
Next time just post:
"I am stupid and i love trolling"
They're doing it the anti-tivo way (Score:2)
Tivo only makes money from patent income. Looks like RIM will be paying everyone else. You're doing it wrong!
"Beleaguered" (Score:2)
I find it so funny that RIM is now "beleaguered", and it's all due to the outrageous success of Apple whom we were assured would die no more than 10 years ago..
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Stop perpetuating this myth
The truth is that Apple had irrefutable proof that Microsoft had copied source code from Quicktime, they were already in court over this before Steve Jobs came back with the NeXT purchase, and the $150 million investment was part of an out-of-court settlement that included cross-licensing and other terms. It was spun in a way that benefited both companies. To the layman it was a vote of confidence in Apple, to others it was a self-serving ploy by Microsoft to keep a competitor ali