E-DATA WILL NOT EXTEND AMNESTY OFFER
SAYS PROGRAM HEIGHTENED AWARENESS OF INTERNET PATENT
WILL STEP UP SUITS AGAINST INFRINGERS
Secaucus, NJ ...August 6, 1996... E-data Corporation (OTC Bulletin Board:GIFT) announced today that it would not extend its amnesty offer to infringers of its key Internet patent beyond the original expiration date of August 31. The unusual private amnesty offer, believed to be the first in U.S. patent history, was launched on June 1 with a mailing of information packages and license agreements to 25,000 Internet and other companies. E-data offered to forgive past infringement if the recipients took licenses.
"We have achieved our goal of heightened awareness of E-data among content providers and resellers in cyberspace," said company president Arnold L. Freilich. "Our patent is the talk of the industry. At this point, however, almost every infringer is waiting to see what the courts have to say before signing licenses.
"So E-data will immediately step up enforcement activities against infringers, large and small, even before the amnesty period ends as originally scheduled, on August 31.
"We will, however, grant royalty-free licenses to tax-exempt institutions such as universities who specifically request it and furnish proof of their tax exemption," Freilich stated.
David Fink, patent counsel to the company, said that a recent review of prior art reconfirmed E-data's strong belief that its U.S. patent No. 4,528,643 entitled "System for Reproducing Information in Material Objects at a Point of Sale Location" is valid and enforceable. Fink noted that the legal term prior art merely means anything in the public domain prior to the filing date of the patent.
E-data has suits pending in federal courts in New York and Connecticut against more than two dozen companies who offer software, type fonts, digital images and information through certain PC and CD-ROM transactions.
E-data has already licensed IBM, VocalTec, Adobe and six other companies with activities on the World Wide Web of the Internet. |
