Posts Tagged ‘legal’

Novatel sues ZTE and Franklin over MiFi-related patents

Smartphones aren't the only mobile devices caught up in patent warfare , it seems: Novatel's just sued ZTE and Franklin over five patents related to the "key architecture and functionality" of its MiFi series of mobile hotspots. What's interesting is that Verizon carries the MiFi and ZTE-built Fivespot , while Sprint's MiFi lives alongside the ZTE Peel and carrier-branded Franklin modems, so we're curious to see if any of the carriers step in to mediate the dispute.

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Motorola slaps Microsoft with a pair of patent infringement lawsuits, says it’s such a shame

Looks like Motorola's about to fight a legal battle on two fronts -- Apple on one hand , and Microsoft on the other. Microsoft fired the first shot last month with a nine-patent ITC complaint and a second salvo alleging that Motorola was charging unfair licensing fees for 802.11 WiFi and H.264 video last week, it's now Moto's turn to retaliate with a pair of legal complaints. The cellular company now claims that Redmond's infringing a total of sixteen patents with everything from Microsoft Exchange to Bing Maps to the Windows operating system itself -- as well as the aforementioned video codecs and wireless tech, of course.

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Apple sues Motorola right back over six patents

What, you didn't think Apple was just going to sit around and take it after Motorola first sued for patent infringement and then asked to court to declare some 20 of Cupertino's patents weren't applicable to its products, did you? Apple's fired back with two lawsuits claiming that Motorola's Android phones, including but not limited to the Droid, Droid 2, Droid X, Cliq, Cliq XT, BackFlip, Devour A555, Devour i1, and Charm, infringe a total of six multitouch and OS patents. That would be pretty much par for the course -- you sue me, I sue you -- but there are a couple interesting strategic wrinkles to note: We've only seen Apple litigate one of these patents before: #7,479,949, Touch Screen Device, Method, and Graphical User Interface for Determining Commands by Applying Heuristics.

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Apple awarded limited patent on pinch-to-zoom

Boom: Apple was just awarded a patent on pinch-to-zoom for multitouch displays. That's the first directly applicable patent we've seen on the gesture since we first started looking during the Apple / Palm war of words in January 2009, and it certainly gives Apple some potent ammunition against its competitors -- although there are some specific limitations on what Apple's been granted that will prove to be important

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Apple loses, challenges patent verdict surrounding Cover Flow and Time Machine

Remember that one random company who sued Apple back in March of 2008 for ripping off its display interface patents? Turns out it was filed in the Eastern District of Texas, a hotbed for patent trolls who know that they stand a better-than-average chance of winning simply because of where their issues are being taken up.

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Skyhook: Google forced Motorola to drop our location service, delay the Droid X

We figured Skyhook's business interference and patent infringement lawsuits against Google would turn up some dirt, and we didn't have long to wait: the location-services company's complaint flatly alleges that Google's Andy Rubin ordered Motorola's Sanjay Jha to "stop ship" on the Droid X because it used Skyhook's XPS positioning system instead of Google Location Services, a tiff that ultimately delayed the phone's release while Moto reworked the software and dropped Skyhook entirely. Following that, Skyhook claims that Google then went after an unidentified "Company X" ( likely Samsung ) and forced it to drop XPS as well. Ouch

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Motorola manages $162 million Q2 profit, turns that frown upside down

It's a good day here, because rather than poor 'ol Sad Moto we get to bust out Happy Moto, as Motorola has released some good news in its Q2 financial report. Earnings were $162 million, up from $26 million this time last year . That sounds like a big jump, but compared to overall sales of $5.4 billion you can see things are still rather tight -- especially since those sales were down from $5.5 billion the year before and all-important mobile device sales figures dropped six percent to $1.7 billion

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CTIA sues San Francisco over cellphone radiation law

San Francisco may have signed cellphone radiation labels into law , but the stickers won't stick without a fight -- the Cellular Telephone Industries Association (CTIA) just filed a complain in federal district court, claiming the new law supersedes the FCC's authority to regulate radio emissions and misleads consumers into believing some phones are safer than others. As we've discussed previously, the CTIA does have something of a point. Every phone that makes it to market is rigorously tested for cell phone radiation levels, and those that pass fall below a specific 1.6 watt per kilogram threshold already

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House passes Cellphone Contraband Act of 2010, prisoners go back to writing letters

Oh, we know all about doin' time. We watched both Oz and The Wire in their entirety, and have seen Let's Go To Prison , like, eight times.

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NTP awakes, sues Apple, Microsoft, Google, HTC, LG, and Motorola over wireless email patents

Remember NTP ?

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