Apple 1 Samsung 0

Trademarks are trademarks, patents are patents and copyright is copyright and all should and need to be protected but one has to question the findings of a US jury in San Jose. They have delivered a massive blow to Samsung and awarded Apple $1.05bn (£665m) in damages in an intellectual property lawsuit.

The ironic thing is that Samsung are one of Apple’s largest suppliers of chips and other technology which underpin its own iOS technology. It also begs the question as to whether the result would have been the same if Samsung was US and Apple from South Korea?

Now follows lengthy and costly appeals and Apple pressing for import bans against Samsung’s devices and probably others.

Is this a good result for consumers? In the short run probably not as it will certainly slow down the Android market and restrict some devices. Apple will continue to dominate the tablet market and prices will remain at a premium. The one party that may be rubbing their hands today are also American and being late to the party now have a chance to shine through being different – Microsoft.

Nokia Open Up A Patent Toll Both

Nokia has announced that Apple will pay to use the their technologies, and finally ends a long-running patent litigation between the companies.

First Nokia sued Apple in 2009 and that was followed by Apple countersuing and that was followed by Nokia extending the action last year. The areas of dispute included 3G, Wi-Fi technology, caller ID and touch interfaces.

Apple will make an undisclosed one-off payment to be followed by further undisclosed ongoing royalties and although the figures remain confidential it is clear from Nokia’s statement that it is likely to be significant.

The development will almost certainly mean that other manufacturers using Google’s Android platform are now likely to have to pay Nokia for using the same set of patents. This could be beneficial to Apple who may have higher margins in which to play than their competitors and may also have less of an infringement to settle. Whatever the outcome Nokia has a new source of revenues and perhaps can now use this to move forward.

Amazon Patent Comes Out of Woodwork

Engadget scored a significant scoop in its exclusive article on Amazon’s patent on e-readers with secondary LCD displays. Apparently the patent was filed some 4 years ago for US only rights and so wasn't required to publish the patent application. The one refernce picked out by engadget refers to a two screen device.

A handheld electronic device comprising: a housing; an electronic paper display disposed in the housing and having a first surface area; and a liquid crystal display (LCD) disposed in the housing proximate the electronic paper display, the LCD having a second surface area that is smaller than the first surface area of the electronic paper display.

Whether Amazon takes legal actions against others is uncertain and the obvious targets are the Nook and the Alex readers from Barnes and Noble and Spring Design. More interesting is that this effectively would kill off any thoughts anyone may have to create a dual screen reader , what its impact is on any clamshell tablets such as the KNO tablet and whether it will impact mobile developments in the future.

It is hard to believe that the Amazon patent can’t be challenged, that it was granted long after these devices can to market, that no challenge was made by Amazon given that they had a patent pending and finally that it only applies to a single region. It would suggest that Amazon’s application was speculative and will simply slip away but we may be wrong.

Patent Moves

The European Commission has reiterated its demand for the creation of a single European patent stating that the absence of such a protection is hindering the growth of technology companies in the European Union. The Commission state that though, they have announced increased funding for technology research this was only part of the its plan to create more economic value from EU research.

Patents operated by the European Patent Office (EPO), can cover most of Europe but the office is not part of EU government. EPO can approval patent applications but these are granted only in the countries specified and not automatically in all the countries signed up to its governing principles, the European Patent Convention.
The Commission has recommended to the Parliament and Council that a single EU patent would help to create more economic value from research.

As if on cue, Discovery, known for the Discovery Channel, TLC, Animal Planet, filed suit today against Amazon in the US District Court for the District of Delaware, alleging infringement of a patent filed by the company in September of 1999. Describing an "Electronic Book Security and Copyright Protection System," the patent was awarded in 2007.

The suit claims, "Amazon's infringing activities...include the operation of the Amazon.com website and the provision of services related to the Kindle and Kindle 2 through and by the website, including but not limited to the sale of electronic books."

The patent describes a system that "provides for secure distribution of electronic text and graphics to subscribers and secure storage." This covers distribution to bookstores, public libraries, and schools as well as consumers equipped with a "home subsystem." "The home subsystem connects to a secure video distribution system or variety of alternative secure distribution systems, generates menus and stores text, and transacts through communicating mechanisms," The patent continues, "A portable book-shaped viewer is used for secure viewing of the text. A billing system performs the transaction, management, authorization, collection and payments utilizing the telephone system or a variety of alternative communication systems using secure techniques."

On a different note we also read about Andrew Harsley, who appeared on the popular UK TV program ‘Dragons Den’ and not only caught the attention of millions of television viewers, but also secured an investment of £150K for the Rapstrap plastic cable tie on the show. Harsley has since won a £35 million contract for up to a billion units of his cable ties and secured patents in Mexico and China.

Patents are clearly big business and infringement can be even bigger years later.

Discovering New eBook Players

Sometimes its fun to unearth news and sometimes its hard work. Today those smart industry watches at Publishers Lunch made what could have been a throwaway paragraph about a new ebook reader patent from Discovery Communications, who we all know through their Discovery Channel. The news was at best brief and said nothing other than they had got US patent clearance.

Finding more information was very difficult but appears that have been awarded a patent is for an ‘‘electronic book secure communication system” for the home and library by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office on March 6. The patent is ‘‘a new way to distribute books and other textual information to bookstores, libraries and consumers.”

Apparently from a report lodged in Gazzette.net the e-book home system is essentially an electronic library that is accessible usable through a portable book shaped electronic reader.

The concept of the system is apparently based on utilising video signal format to also deliver text and a subsystem that allows it to be received and readers to select books and periodicals. This communications distribution is the obvious key ‘‘a novel combination of new technology involving the television, cable, telephone and computer industries.” and similar in concept to the wireless approach that Amazon took in removing the need for the intermediary PC.

The patent is reported to say ‘‘Using the entire video signal, thousands of books may be transmitted within just one hour of air time.” The e-book reader would ‘‘both read books and to interact with the home library software.”

We are left to wonder whether it will ever happen or whether it was just another patent filed. What is clear is that the Sony and the Kindle are transient technology solutions and like others that compete in different user space will be forced into the convergence route. The Blackberry is a classic example of a one dimensional tool thaty is now chasing the convergence ticket to survive. Steve Jobs knows that the iPhone will be a point of convergence so there is little point in developing short life product.

Interestingly there will be the library battles between the Adobe Digital Editions and other media libraries and Discovery may be angling to position themselves here as trusted gatekeepers. What is clear is that the tipping point will not be the ebookreader as we know it today.

Who owns MP3 Intellectual Property?

Yesterday Microsoft was ordered by the Federal District Court in San Diego jury to pay $1.52 billion in a patent dispute over the MP3 format. The format is the technology at the heart of the boom in digital music and if upheld on appeal, the verdict would be the largest patent judgment on record. The ruling, in, was a victory for Alcatel-Lucent, whose acquisitions include Bell Laboratories, which was involved in the development of MP3 almost two decades ago.

MP3 was developed by a consortium which included the Fraunhofer Institute, a large German research organization, the French electronics company Thomson and Bell Labs. Microsoft and others have licensed MP3 from the consortium. The current case turns on two patents that Alcatel claims were developed by Bell Labs before it joined with Fraunhofer to develop MP3.

At issue is the way the Windows Media Player software from Microsoft plays audio files using MP3, the most common method of distributing music on the Internet. If the ruling stands, and hundreds of other companies that make products that play MP3 files, including Apple, portable players, computers and software, could also face demands to pay royalties to Alcatel.

Other patent trials are pending for technology related to speech recognition, user interfaces and video processing and the world of patents just got a lot messier. The previous largest award for a patent infringement case was in 1990, when Kodak was ordered to pay $909 million to Polaroid for violating patents related to instant cameras. That case also forced Kodak to exit the instant photography market and recall its cameras.

The MP3 appeals process is likely to take years to resolve and in the meantime it is not expected that the courts will force Microsoft to remove the MP3 functions from Windows.