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Technology Firms Urge Patent Litigation Reform in U.S.
A group of leading technology companies, including Intel, Cisco and Hewlett-Packard, have formed a coalition, tentatively called Coalition for Patent Fairness, to lobby for patent litigation reform. Although the coalition has yet to provide a list of policy goals, it has stated that it will focus on several patent litigation aspects it believes are being abused in the current system, including the standards for injunctive relief, royalties and damages, as well as choice of venue.
One of the concerns of particular interest to the Coalition relates to so-called patent-trolls. Patent-trolls are companies that file patent infringement suits to gain injunctive relief, which grants a hold on product use or shipment related to the patent in order to force settlement offers. The issue was highlighted recently in the NTP-Research In Motion case, where the injunctive relief provided to NTP threatened the shutdown of RIM’s Blackberry service. RIM eventually agreed to settle the suit for $612.5 million (U.S.). There has been some recent development in this regard which is summarized for your review below.
The Coalition is also talking to leaders in various other industries including automotive, energy, financial services, manufacturing and retail.
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