The blog & portfolio of Matthew J. Rogers

Blackberry patent dispute finally over

March 4, 2006

The years-long patent dispute between holding company NTP (read: a company that patents abstract ideas and then sits on them until some else makes a good product so they can extort money from the successful company) is finally over, with RIM agreeing to cough up $612 million. Could have been worse; at least RIM won’t have to pay any royalties or modify their current systems. This is stupid, though, because ALL of NTP’s patents are about to be finally rejected by the PTO as invalid patents. However, the judge presiding over the case was sick of both sides’ stalling tactics, and ordered a settlement or else he very well might have shut the whole network down. If it would have gone on a little longer, and if all the patents had been rejected, RIM might not have had to pay anything. Oh well…they have the cash, and it’s all over. Hopefully RIM can get back to concentrating on new devices and services.

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