So where's the evidence to support the idea that WiLAN could win in court?
---In wilan@yahoogroups.com, <no_reply@yahoogroups.com> wrote:
TQP v Newegg shows why NPEs will continue to thrive in a post-Goodlatte world
One thing that online retailer Newegg can feel pleased about following its resounding defeat yesterday in an Eastern District Court of Texas patent case against TQP is that the suit was not fought under the conditions set out in Representative Bob Goodlatte’s Innovation Act 2013. Had it been, the company would not only be facing up to a damages payment of $2.6 million today, it would also be looking at paying the costs of the NPE founded by IPNav’s Erich Spangenberg.
This case shows exactly why anyone hoping that the Goodlatte Act will, if passed, kill off patent assertion entities is going to be profoundly disappointed. It won’t. The simple fact is that Spangenberg was so confident of the quality and provenance of the patent in suit that he was willing to put everything on the line to assert it. He went to court because he thought he would win. And that’s why other NPEs - the likes of Acacia, Conversant, WiLan, IV etc - assert their rights and go to court too. The Innovation Act will not stop them. Patent licensing is what they do; they will live with whatever regime they have to.
Of course, Goodlatte may well force them to incur extra up-front costs, but they will get these back if they are successful. And they will expect to be successful – they undertake detailed due diligence and analysis before purchasing any patent right, let alone asserting it. As for transparency, in this case Spangenberg put himself on the witness stand.
In many reports of the case, TQP has been described or alluded to as a patent troll. But let’s be clear here: the NPE asserted a patent, took it all the way to court, had it tried in front of a jury, saw it declared valid and infringed, and was awarded damages. In doing all this, it also ensured that Michael Jones, the original owner of the patent, will add to the close to $600,000 he has already made from the firm’s licensing activities; that is an inventor is being rewarded for his inventiveness; this despite the fact that TQP was under no obligation to give Jones a cent as it had acquired the patent from another source back in 2006.
Aren’t trolls supposed to be scared of court because they assert low-quality patents that do not stand up to any kind of scrutiny and do nothing to reward inventiveness and innovation? Or is the term really just shorthand for “entities that have business models which I don’t like”?
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emphasis added by yours truly.
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