Welcome to new edition of weekly patent news. A show where we provide a quick recap of latest happenings in the Patent world in the last week.
Rockstar Consortium, which is jointly held by Apple, Microsoft, BlackBerry, Sony and Ericsson, has agreed to sell 4000 patents to RPX, which is a patent clearinghouse that helps companies protect themselves from patent litigation.
Rockstar purchased 6,000 patents from the bankrupt Nortel Networks in 2011. The remaining 2,000 patents which are not part of the deal are believed to be the most valuable of the collection and have already been distributed among the five members, with some 1,000 patents obtained by Apple and the rest divided among the four companies.
The deal is the latest sign of a cooling in the smartphone patent wars, which is just awesome.
In other patent news
Microsoft has agreed to pay VirnetX another $23 million to settle an expanded patent dispute between the two companies. Microsoft had earlier paid VirnetX $200 million in 2010 as part of a networking-patent violation case.
In the latest case, VirnetX alleged that Microsoft infringed on VirnetX patents with Skype
VirnetX is in the patent-licensing company. It also won $368 million verdict in 2013 against Apple, which was later overturned.
Vancouver-based video surveillance company Avigilon acquired the entire patent portfolio and patent licensing program of ObjectVideo for $80.3 million FOR 76 U.S. and international patents and over 50 U.S. and international patent applications.
ObjectVideo’s video analytics patents are licensed and deployed by over 90 IP video manufacturers around the world including Sony, Panasonic, and Bosch
Ames, Ohio based biofuels company Renewable Energy Group has settled four patent lawsuits with Neste Oil Corp. of Finland. REG inherited the lawsuits by acquiring Syntroleum a struggling Tulsa renewable fuels company.
As part of the resulting settlement agreement, REG has licensed Neste technology for use at its Geismar plant.
Apple TV patent turns iPhones into remote displays.
When a group of people gather to watch a movie, often someone has to leave the room to grab snacks or take a dump. With this patent, the person receives synchrozied movie from Apple TV on his iPhone, so that he does not miss on anything.
The technology involves a user receiving video stream from a content source like Apple cloud, which is being viewed on a TV via Apple TV. A user then uses his iphone to quickly obtain a synchrozied video stream from Apple TV, which is then played on the iPhone as long as the user wants.
Nike patented a shirt that tracks heart rate and blood pressure while you exercise.
Nike’s patent has sensors that touch the wearer’s skin. There also may be applications for professional sports, which could be why Nike’s patent covers transmitting data over radio frequencies
ITS TIME FOR THE COURTROOM SECTION
The brewing legal war between Cisco and Arista gained momentum amid a battle of blog posts last week. Cisco initiated the latest round by petitioning the US International Trade Commission for an injunction to prohibit Arista from importing and selling products using Cisco-patented technology within the US.
Arista was founded in 2004, led by Jayshree Ullal who had previously served as senior vice president of data center and switching at Cisco, while reporting to CEO John Chambers.
Nintendo faces plenty of patent challenges in the courts, the majority of which it wins. The Wii and its Remote have been targeted a great deal. Last year, Creative Kingdoms, a “theme park operator” claimed that the Wii Remote infringed on the patent for it ‘magic wand’ controllers.
The International Trade Commission ruled that “Creative Kingdoms’ patents are invalid and should not have been issued because Creative Kingdoms tried to claim more than the company invented”.
MOVING TO THE INTERNATIONAL NEWS
Consistent with the position in the United States and Europe, Australian Federal Court delivered a judgment that computer-implemented business methods are patentable in Australia only if they produce an ‘artificial effect’ that goes beyond mere implementation of an abstract idea or scheme in a generic computer.
Europe’s top court has opened the door to certain stemcell patents in European Union by ruling that an organism incapable of developing into a human being is not a human embryo and may be patented.
Although work on stem cell therapies is still experimental, researchers believe they have potential to treat a range of diseases from Parkinson’s to blindness.
IT IS TIME FOR THIS WEEK IN HISTORY
On December 23
1879 Thomas Edison patented a magneto-electric machine.
On December 24
1974 Charles Beckley received a patent for a folding chair.
On December 25
1984 L.F. Holland patented an improved trailer aka mobile home .
On December 26
1933 Edwin Armstrong was granted a patent for a two-path FM radio .
We wish you and yours Happy Holidays FROM the PATENTYOGI TEAM. Here are 5 amazing Santa Claus patents.
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