Bonum Certa Men Certa

Regulators Target Patent Trolls But Lose Sight of Patent Cartels

Hammer



Summary: Action is finally being taken against patent abuse, even though it does not go far enough

TECHRIGHTS has gathered a lot of information on Intellectual Ventures and so did a paper from early in the year, which states accurately: [via Stefano Zacchiroli, the Debian Project Leader]



The new mass aggregator, however, is an entirely different beast. To begin with, funding sources for mass aggregators include some very successful and respectable organizations, including manufacturing companies such as Apple, eBay, Google, Intel, Microsoft, Nokia, and Sony, as well as academic institutions such as the University of Pennsylvania and Notre Dame, and other entities such as the World Bank and the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation. Nations such as China, France, South Korea, and Taiwan even have their own mass aggregators to varying degrees.

Moreover, the acquisition appetites and patent supply sources are quite interesting. Mass aggregators may have portfolios that range across vastly different areas of innovation from computers to telecommunications to biomedicine to nanotechnology. In some of the acquisition activity, mass aggregators purchase large chunks, and even the majority, of an operating company’s patents and patent applications. They typically pay cash up front, as well as a share of any future profits generated from asserting the patents against anyone other than the selling manufacturer. Mass aggregators have engaged in other unusual acquisition approaches as well, including purportedly purchasing the rights to all future inventions by researchers at universities in developing countries. Other acquisition approaches purportedly include targeted purchases of patents that are of particular interest to the mass aggregators’ investors.

The types of returns promised to investors and the types of benefits offered to participants are also quite different from garden-variety non-practicing entities, as are some of the tactics used in organizing the entities and in asserting the patents. Finally, the scale itself is simply mind-boggling. Mass aggregators operate on a scale and at a level of sophistication and complexity that would have been unimaginable a decade ago. They have taken the prototype strategies pioneered by a prior generation of non-practicing entities and changed them into some of the cleverest strategies yet seen in the intellectual property rights field.

The goal of this article is to shed some light on mass aggregators. We hope to provide some understanding of the nature of the change, to analyze its economics and implications, and to offer some normative considerations. In the descriptive section, we focus on the oldest and largest of the mass aggregators, Intellectual Ventures, which has gone to great lengths to maintain secrecy. Working from public sources and investing thousands of hours of research, we offer a detailed picture of the entity, tracing through approximately 1300 shell companies and thousands of patents. The section also describes in brief form several other mass aggregators, including ones that are public companies.


These are cartels and they should be made illegal. They inflate prices and deflate innovation. We dealt with the subject before.

There is an article in the BBC titled "Phone patents: An absurd battle". iophk says it proposes patent trolls as a solution and adds: "I am surprised that Intellectual Ventures was not promoted. That's one of the biggest if not the biggest" (it is).

I cannot read this article in the UK. Neither can Glyn Moody, who wrote: "wow, this is fun: the #BBC won't let me access the bbc.com site 'cos I'm in UK - http://bit.ly/Q5SK2Q ironic much?"

Good ol' BBC is still serving plutocrats, not taxpayers who fund it obligatorily.

Here is what Groklaw quotes from this article: "One reason boils down to the nature of mobile devices like smartphones and tablets, according to Daniel O'Connor, a self-styled anti-trust and internet policy wonk as well as senior director of public policy at the Computer and Communications Industry Association. He says that software is a particularly active area for patents, especially anything to do with telecommunications, semiconductors and 4G data networks. Software patents are also particularly broad and vague, and that makes infringement difficult to avoid. "That creates the conditions for a kind of patent perfect storm," O'Connor says....

"[M]ost of these patents don't just make a single claim to a particular intellectual property right - on average each patent makes more like 20 such claims. That means that this collection of 250,000 patents actually describes about five million restrictions on what mobile device makers can do while they design a new model. Realistically an individual may be able to keep five, 10 or maybe 20 restrictions in mind when designing a new feature for a mobile device, but probably not 50 or 500. And five million? Not a chance."

The solution should be to rethink patents, not create cartels with them. Innovative Automation (IA), a company named in a comical way like IV, shows that even cartel members are not safe. Apple got sued while still assembling a new part of the patent cartel:



Back on September tenth we posted a report revealing the fact that Apple had acquired 434 LTE centric patents. One of the original sources of our report stated that Rockstar Bidco, a company that Apple holds the majority stake in, acquired 116 LTE patents from Nortel, giving them a total of 434 LTE patents. It's now been revealed that Apple had been acquiring even more patents over the summer and the list is extensive.

In a report filed yesterday, Business Insider listed a link to the US Patent Office which linked to a series of patent assignments between Nortel, Rockstar Bidco and Apple. The list totaled up to 1375 patents originating from Nortel, with the vast majority of them being assigned to Apple. Some of the listed patents have yet to be assigned to Apple as shown here and here.


Google's talking points from the patents team focus on trolls rather than the cartel as their problem. They are focusing on trolls instead of the system as a whole because the want Google to become part of the cartel, hence part of the problem. That's how patent lawyers think. Regulators are said to be taking a look at this problem:

U.S. antitrust authorities are examining whether specialized patent-holding firms—or "trolls" to their detractors—are disrupting competition in high-tech markets, opening a new front in a long-standing Silicon Valley battle.

"There's a possibility of competitive harm here," said Joseph Wayland, who served as the Justice Department's acting antitrust chief until last week, when he stepped down to return to private practice. Mr. Wayland said officials are devoting "huge energy, particularly at a senior level" to this and other antitrust issues surrounding patents.


Other reports like this one from Reuters say that the US-leaning ITC is also taking a look:

The US International Trade Commission will review a judge's decision which found that Apple did not violate patents owned by Samsung in making the iPod touch, iPhone and iPad.

An administrative law judge at the ITC had said in a preliminary ruling in September that Apple was innocent of violating the patents. The ITC, which could have opted to simply uphold the judge's decision, said that it would take up the matter. A final decision is expected in January.


The FTC focuses on patent trolls and not cartels:

US antitrust enforcers are getting mighty interested in patent trolls. The Federal Trade Commission has even taken to calling these lawsuit-happy companies "patent assertion entities," or PAEs.

"There's a possibility of competitive harm here," said Joseph Wayland, who was the head of antitrust enforcement at the Justice Department until last week. Wayland just left the government for private practice, and he told the Wall Street Journal there is "huge energy, particularly at a senior level" being spent on scrutinizing the intersection of patents and antitrust.

The FTC and the Department of Justice announced today they will host a public forum on December 10 to study the issue more closely. The speakers include IP lawyers, law professors specializing in these so-called PAEs, and even officers of high-profile patent trolls like Intellectual Ventures and Round Rock Research LLC. Executives from companies that have been critical of patent-holding companies, such as Cisco and Rackspace, will also be featured.


Here is more:

The US Department of Justice (DoJ) and US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) are opening informal hearings next month which will look into the question of whether specialised patent-holding firms, also known as "patent trolls" to many, are disrupting competition in technology markets. Concerns that non-practising entities (NPEs) – companies that hold patents but do not make use of them – cause problems in the market have existed for some time. The traditional "troll", a small company holding a handful of patents, has in recent years been joined by the huge patent-holding corporations who buy up hundreds of patents. The aim of the NPEs is to get licence revenue from companies who they claim are infringing the patents they hold.


They ought to look at the cartels, not just trolls. We'll make this point again at the end of the night (addressing the USPTO as a whole, not just the ITC). The patent system is as inherently corrupt as the political system, which corporations control at people's expense and to people's detriment.

Recent Techrights' Posts

[Meme] 9AM Meeting at Brett Wilson LLP
Brett Wilson LLP in space
 
Links 18/07/2025: Peace With PKK and Connie Francis Dies
Links for the day
Gemini Links 18/07/2025: Alhena 5.1.8 and Bornhack 2025
Links for the day
How to Top Up a "Limited Liability" With Even More Limitations (Dodging Accountability in the UK)
Some people call it a "shell game". Sometimes it's done for tax evasion purposes.
Free Software Foundation, Inc. (FSF) Inches Towards 75% of Fund-Raising Target
Will the cutoff date be extended again?
Gemini Space (or Geminispace) Grows, But Usage of Certificate Authority Let's Encrypt Drops Further
Ideally, all Gemini capsules should use self-signed certificates
Links 18/07/2025: More Microsoft Layoffs in Activision, The New Stack (Sponsored by Microsoft) Complains About Openwashing
Links for the day
Gemini Links 18/07/2025: OCC25 Gnus for Reading Usenet and RSS Feeds, Small Web Updates
Links for the day
Listing as Staff People Who Left the Company More Than Six Years Earlier
There are apparently no laws against that
Brian Fagioli Shovels Up LLM Slop (Plagiarism) Onto Slashdot, Then Uses Slashdot for Affirmation or as Badge of Honour
Notice how some of his latest slop is presented ("as featured on Slashdot")
Social Control Media Productivity
Snapping photos of the bone
The Law Firm SLAPPing Us For the Microsofters Lost 72% of Its Tangible Assets in the Past Year, According to Its Own Reports
That might help explain why they're willing to tolerate serial stranglers from Microsoft as clients
Slopwatch: LinuxSecurity.com Slopfarm and Slopfarms Propped Up by Google News
"As LLM slop is foisted onto the WWW in place of knowledge and real content, it now gets ingested and processed by other LLMs, creating a sort of ouroboros of crap."
Links 18/07/2025: Weather Events and Health Hazards
Links for the day
Microsoft's All-Time Low in Finland
Microsoft is in a freefall
Security: Shane Wegner & Debian statement of incompetence
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, July 17, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, July 17, 2025
Gemini Links 17/07/2025: "Goodreads for Gemini" and Defence of "The Small Web"
Links for the day
Links 17/07/2025: Anger and Morale Issues at Microsoft, Wars and Conflicts Get Digital
Links for the day
CALEA / CALEA2 is the Real Problem, Not Chinese Operatives Exploiting CALEA / CALEA2 (as Any Other Nation Can)
CALEA / CALEA2 is more of a front door than a back door
99.99% Uptime in First Half of 2025
Since January there was only one noticeable outage
Nils Torvalds and Anna "Mikke" Torvalds (née Törnqvis) Hopefully Use GNU/Linux by Now
"Torvalds Family Uses Windows, Not Linus’ Linux"
Attack of the Slopfarms
FUD-amplifying bots with slop images, slop text (LLM slop)
When People Call a Best/Close Friend of Bill Gates a "Serial Rapist"
Good thing that the Linux Foundation keeps the "Linux" trademark ("Linux Mark") clean
Not My Problem, I Don't Care
Context/inspiration: Martin Niemöller
Honest Journalism About the European Patent Office Ceased to Exist After SLAPPs and Bribes to the Media
The EPO is basically a Mafia
Microsoft Bankruptcy in Russia, Shutdown in Pakistan, What Next?
It seems possible that in 2025 alone Microsoft will have laid off over 50,000 workers
Life Became Simpler When I Stopped Driving and I Don't Miss Driving When I See "Modern" Cars
Gee, wonder why car sales have plummeted...
Why I Believe Brett Wilson LLP and Its Microsoft Clients Are All Toast
So far our legal strategy has worked perfectly
EPO Jobs Are Very Toxic and Bad for One's Health
Health first, not monopolies
Response to Ryo Suwito Regarding the Four Freedoms
the point of life isn't to make more money
Microsoft's Morale Circling Down the Drain
Or gutter, toilet etc.
What Matters More Than "Market Share"
The goal is freedom, not "market share"
Tech Used to be Fun. To Many of Us It's Still Fun.
You can just watch it from afar and make fun of it all
Links 17/07/2025: "Blog Identity Crisis" and Openwashing by Nvidia
Links for the day
Greffiers and the US Attorney of the Serial Strangler From Microsoft
The lawsuit can help expose extensive corruption in the American court system as well
Credit Suisse collapse obfuscated Parreaux, Thiébaud & Partners scandal
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
The People Who Promoted systemd in Debian Also Promote Wayland
This is not politics
UK Media Under Threat: Cannot Report on Data Breach, Cannot Report on Microsoft Staff Strangling Women
The story of super injunction (in the British media this week, years late)
Victims of the Serial Strangler From Microsoft, Alex Balabhadra Graveley, Wanted to Sue Him But Lacked the Funds (He Attacked Their Finances)
Having spoken to victims of the Serial Strangler From Microsoft
Links 17/07/2025: Science, Hardware, and Censorship
Links for the day
Gemini Links 17/07/2025: Staying in the "Small Web" and Back on ICQ
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, July 16, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, July 16, 2025
Under the Guise of "MIT Technology Review Insights" the Site MIT Technology Review Posts Corporate Spam as 'Articles'
Some of the articles aren't even articles but 'hit pieces' against Free software and some are paid advertisements
Brett Wilson LLP Has Track Record in Scam Coin Cases (e.g. Craig Wright and More), Now It Works for 'Crypto' Scam Purveyors
But wait, it gets worse
Exclusive: corruption in Tribunals, Greffiers, from protection rackets to cat whisperers
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Will Brett Wilson LLP Handle Its Own Winding Up Petition or be Struck Off for Overt Abuse of Process?
Today we sue not only the first Microsofter
Links 16/07/2025: Chip Bans and Microsoft’s “Digital Escort” Program
Links for the day
Ubuntu Becomes Microsoft GitHub, Based on Decision Made by British Army Officer
You're hopeless, Canonical
Revolving Doors: One Day You're a Judge, the Next Day You're an Attorney Paying Public Officials and Working for Violent and Dangerous Microsoft Employees
how the US justice system works
Sharing Code and Recipes
It helps explain the triviality of software freedom
Slopwatch: Noise, Plagiarism and Even Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt/Fear-mongering/Dramatisation
What are we meant to do to prevent a false association or misleading connotations? Game the LLMs? No. Boycott slopfarms.
How Many Women Has Microsoft's Alex Balabhadra Graveley Already Strangled and Where Does That End?
If you too are a victim of this man and wish to share information, contact us
Gemini Links 16/07/2025: BaseLibre Numerical System and Simple Web Browsing with TLS
Links for the day
Links 16/07/2025: Fascist Slop Takes "Intelligence" Clothing, New Criminal Case Against MElon
Links for the day
"We Might Save Somebody's Life"
I follow the example of my father
Why I am Suing the Serial Strangler From Microsoft, Alex Balabhadra Graveley, in the UK High Court This Week
Out of respect to the process and to the Court, I shall not share any pertinent details about the case
Links 16/07/2025: China’s Economy Grows Steadily, France Takes Action Regarding Harm to Children by GAFAM and Fentanylware (TikTok)
Links for the day
It is Not About Politics
Beware the people who try to make this about politics
Good Journalism Saves Lives
a shocking number of women die or get seriously hurt every day due to violence from a partner
Recognition of Women's Contributions to Free Software
Being passive is not an option when bad things are happening
Slopfarms Are Going to Perish Because Public Opinion is Changing
Many slopfarms will simply go offline
19 Years of Standing Up for Justice, Equality, and Truth
This week we shall take it up a notch
Gemini Links 16/07/2025: Tmux and OCC25 Working TLS
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, July 15, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, July 15, 2025