Patent Lawsuits in Texas
Based on this week's recent discussion of location, the Rockstar lawsuit against Google seems to be an interesting one. The situation underlies the importance of location in pursuing a patent lawsuit. In the case of Texas, Rockstar is leveraging the favorable leanings towards patents in the eastern District of Texas.
Generally, Rockstar and its subsidiary is employing a common tactic of attempting to milk the money from patent lawsuits. In theory, Rockstar would be able to get payment and possibly royalties if the court in the eastern District of Texas recognizes the claim. Also, it is important to keep in mind that Rockstar is a NPE (non-practicing entity) indicating their sole purpose is to buy up patents and sue these companies to make profit. This approach seems almost too perfect since they were solely formed to sue companies for infringing patents they own but do not create their own products. It would be difficult for other companies to counter-sue since the Rockstar group is essentially a bunch of patents. Some would argue that Samsung should have no problem since this claim is only being pursued on the eastern District of Texas. However, the success of this law suit may encourage other NPE (patent trolls) and companies to attack Samsung on other grounds. A barrage of patent lawsuits can be enough to disrupt the titan in the market as demonstrated with Nokia and Apple. It becomes difficult to determine the NPE's intention and whether it is in the best collective interests of both the consumers and the companies.
In the complaint, there are lawsuit claims on violating patents related to "electronic device carrying electronic component, navigational tool for GUI and integrated message center" to name a few. The issue with these examples is that the patents seem generic in description. Even after looking up the navigational tool patent, I find the patent to not be all inclusive of all present smartphone designs especially in the case of using a "navigational circle" in browsing. At best, the designs presented in this patent is maybe an archaic version of the patent at hand. In the case of the integrated message center, I could see some similarity in the feature that are provided but I am not sure of how else to create a message center without using any variation of quit, sent and received. These patent infringements appear to show Rockstar just blindly taking all the fish out of the barrel, hoping to find the prize (a legally-recognized patent infringement). It does seem obvious since Rockstar happened to snatch the purchase of these patents out of Google's reach in a previous auction. Evidently, the situation goes back to the vicious cycle of gathering patents and suing competitors to keep an edge in the market. Is it necessary to force the companies to change and innovate leading them to cut costs and continue to innovate.
It largely comes down to the location and if Google can get the case moved to northern California. As the population in northern California differs from that in eastern Texas, the jury in both areas would have different leanings for either Samsung or Rockstar. This case will drag on since Rockstar has made an amendment to the claim and Google has recently joined with Samsung. It will be interesting to see how these events turn out.
References:
http://www.fosspatents.com/2014/01/rockstars-addition-of-google-as.html
http://www.google.com/patents/US6037937
http://www.google.com/patents/US6333973
I appreciate that you took the time to examine the patents themselves.
ReplyDeleteRockstar is the perfect example of the weaponization of patents to hurt competition and bring down innovators. The incidence of litigation based on features which seem almost too common is quite ridiculous. Suing another company for a feature like "Slide to unlock" isn't protecting invention and innovation; it's merely just giving multinational corporations an excuse to sue their competition.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you, many patents around now have very simple features and difficult to work around, particularly if they prove to add to the convenience of consumers and thus become a hit. They may be innovative and worth protecting but if the only way others can refrain from infringing is to make their versions more complicated it ends up adding to the inconvenience for us. I do think the lifetime for a software patent should be reduced. Companies should not stand to gain if they do not market their product with their patented ideas first before some other company thinks of it.
DeleteHi Norman:
ReplyDeleteI agree that Rockstar is utilizing the law of patents to maximum, and getting money by simply battling in courts. The fact that they area battling in the Eastern District Courts of Texas, should be very evident that they are solely out to make money by filing lawsuit on the basis of patent infringement. Now, if Google is able to move this court case to Northern California, the story and result would probably be very different given the jury in Northern California will have more of a Silicon Valley bias towards innovation. Then again, it's really hard to make any such judgement call or prediction unless this happened in reality. Patent trolling is simply a way to make money, and this is what Rockstar is doing. Patent trolling hinders innovation.From the perspective of an engineering student, I would say right away that patent trolling should be stopped. However, from the viewpoint of small start-ups and other companies that depend on even making small profit margins, these patent trolls are able to slightly hinder the big corporations from getting too powerful. Then again we need to remember, that companies like Google and Apple are what have spun out the big innovation have not only improved the quality of life and access to information, but also have revolutionized the way in which we live our lives today. Just imagine for a second what you would do without smartphones or Google. It's hard to imagine what your daily life would be like without these innovation, but it was a true fact a little over two decades back when we lived without such luxuries which today have become almost necessary parts and aspects of life. So, patent trolling from the perspective of an engineer seems truly terrible, because innovation is limited.
Interesting note. Rockstar is definitely just another patent troll. But I'm finding one thing more and more as I learn about IP/Patents. And that is that it is not only these companies who are suing to get money. But I feel that a lot of patents are being filed solely to pursue litigation against other companies
ReplyDelete