Bonum Certa Men Certa

Litigation Roundup: Nintendo, TiVo, Apple, Samsung, Huawei, Philips, UMC

...And more legal actions are now being filed in China

The fortunes told



Summary: The latest high-profile legal battles, spanning a growing number of nations and increasingly representing a political shift as well

THE effort to keep abreast of litigation, except nuisance litigation from trolls, carries on. Yesterday we found this report about Nintendo using its sometimes notorious patents to sue a small company, Colopl. A popular gaming site wrote about it:

Nintendo is suing Japanese mobile games developer Colopl for allegedly infringing on five of the publisher's patents.

This lawsuit could be interesting for indie developers worried about patent issues in their own work as well. As Siliconera reports, one of the patent complaints from Nintendo include "the special technology used to operate a joystick over a touch panel" which is featured in Colopl's mobile title White Cat Project. The patent was supposedly originally filed in 2006 with regard to the Nintendo DS wrist strap.


The most media attention has been given to cases that involve one large company suing another. There were several such examples last week. TiVo is now bullying rivals (not a new thing) using patents; what's noteworthy is that it's done via subsidiaries. Averting/reducing risk of counteraction? See "Boston-based TiVo subsidiary sues Comcast for patent infringement", "TiVo Hits Comcast With More Lawsuits Targeting X1", "TiVo Sues Comcast Again, Alleging Operator's X1 Infringes Eight Patents" and "TiVo Sues Comcast Again, Alleging Operator’s X1 Infringes Eight Patents". Here are some details:

TiVo has launched a new legal attack on Comcast aimed a pushing the cable giant to reach a settlement to license TiVo-owned patents.

TiVo's Rovi subsidiary on Wednesday filed two lawsuits in federal district courts, alleging Comcast's X1 platform infringes eight TiVo-owned patents. That includes technology covering pausing and resuming shows on different devices; restarting live programming in progress; certain advanced DVR recording features; and advanced search and voice functionality.


One can only guess (it's not hard) why the lawsuit comes from X1 and not from TiVo (directly).

There's another patent lawsuit against another media company. Philips has just reminded us of its capacity as a patent bully (it has done this for decades). As Reuters put it:

A patent licensing company on Monday accused music-streaming service Spotify of infringing three patents originally granted to Dutch technology giant Philips.

Sisvel, an Italian intellectual property management firm, sued Spotify in U.S. District Court in Delaware, alleging infringement of three patents relating to methods of making music recommendations based on a user’s listening habits.


We wrote quite a lot about Sisvel. We have covered its actions, sometimes at the behest of Philips, for nearly a decade now. Sisvel is still around and it's still vicious. They're behaving like the Mafia at times. What's interesting is that they're European and there aren't many trolls in Europe. There are some, but not many. We hope to keep it that way. There are many activists here who oppose the UPC because they correctly perceive it as an open door to patent trolls. One of those activists is mentioned in this new article about his new game for iPhone. "Florian has fought for the open source movement and small software companies against software patents," it says. That alludes to Florian Müller, who spent years of his busy life covering Apple/Samsung patent disputes. Here is the latest on that:

Apple, Samsung Continue Ongoing War Over Royalties



Another battle in Apple and Samsung’s seemingly ceaseless smartphone patent wars played out in front of a federal judge on Thursday, this one pertaining to Samsung’s redesigns following a jury verdict for Apple in 2014.

The patent, U.S. Patent No. 5,946,647, relates to the operation of quicklinks – a software program that allows users to prompt hyperlinks that can take them to a webpage, a different application platform or perform a function within an operating system.

“Each redesign consisted of only one or two minor changes,” Apple attorney Mark Selwyn told U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh during the prolonged hearing that featured several back-and-forths between the two lawyers.


Speaking of Samsung, there was a lot of press coverage last week regarding Huawei winning a patent infringement lawsuit against it, e.g. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]. Many articles focused on political tensions associated with Huawei (e.g. [1, 2], but nearly all the major sites which cover patent matters focused on Huawei versus Samsung in China. What will be the ramifications for the Korean giant in China and elsewhere? As IAM put it the other day: "Big news out of China - Shenzhen court awards Huawei country’s first-ever injunction based on an “international SEP” in suit against Samsung [...] For China to become a major patent litigation venue, foreign plaintiffs will need to feel that the opposite - ie a Samsung injunction awarded against Huawei - would be equally as possible."

"China may view this as a short-term competitive advantage, but sooner or later firms like Samsung may take their production out of mainland China (if not to avoid sanctions then purely as a form of economic retaliation). What would China be left with if manufacturing goes elsewhere? A pile of worthless patents and lots of law firms?"Well, "injunction" is a euphemism for embargo, either temporary or longterm/permanent. Who benefits from such sanctions? The same goes for the US, which has begun a sort of trade war with China over Huawei devices (cannot be bought from or even stocked by some of the largest carriers). Meanwhile in China, "UMC Files Patent Infringement Lawsuit against Micron," based on a press release from the weekend.

As we've argued before, China seems to be emulating Texas and we don't think that's a good thing at all. China may view this as a short-term competitive advantage, but sooner or later firms like Samsung may take their production out of mainland China (if not to avoid sanctions then purely as a form of economic retaliation). What would China be left with if manufacturing goes elsewhere? A pile of worthless patents and lots of law firms? What made China attractive for many firms (for manufacturing at least) isn't strong patent "protection" but perhaps the very opposite of that.

Recent Techrights' Posts

Trajectory of The Register: From News Site/s Into "B2B"... and Into Microsoft Salespeople
Something isn't right at The Register
Doing My Share to Tackle Online Slop and SPAM
Trying my best to 'fix' the Web
Slopwatch: Fakes, FUD, Duplicates, and Charlatans Galore
The Web as we once know it is collapsing. Some opportunists try to replace it with low-quality slop.
The Register UK Seems to Have Become American and Management is Changing (Microsofter as Editor in Chief)
The Register 'UK' is now controlled by the Directions on Microsoft guy
 
"New Techrights" Soon Turns 2 (A Few Days Before the FSF Turns 40)
We have a lot more to say about LLM bots
When Silence Says So Much
Garrett, a 'secure' boot pusher, will need to defend himself in the UK High Court
The Register in Trouble
There is not much that can be done at this point
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, July 26, 2025
IRC logs for Saturday, July 26, 2025
Misinformation in Social Control Media
Social control media passes around all sorts of tropes
Slopwatch: Fake Linux 'Articles' and Slopfarms With "Linux" in Their Names/Domains
throwing bots at "Linux" to make some fake articles
Links 26/07/2025: Amazon Shutdown in China, Russian Economy Slows
Links for the day
Gemini Links 26/07/2025: History of Time (1988) and Gemini Games
Links for the day
Links 26/07/2025: 50 Percent Tariffs in Amazon, Dying Intel Offloads Network and Edge Group (NEX)
Links for the day
Blaming Programming Languages for Users' and Developers' Bad Practices
That's like blaming cars for drivers who crash into things
Many People Still Read Techrights Because It Says the Truth, Produces Evidence, and Does Not Self-Censor
Unlike so many other sites
The Register is Desperate for Money, According to The Register
I decided to check how they're doing as a business
Microsoft Finally Finds a Use Case for Slop?
Create low-quality chaff to shift the media's attention?
Microsoft Windows Lost 400 Million Users in a Few Years, Why Does The Register Double Down on Windows With New US Editor?
days ago they hired a new US editor
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, July 25, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, July 25, 2025
For Libel Reform One Must First Bring (or Raise) Awareness to the Issues and Their Magnitude
I myself know, from personal experience
Links 26/07/2025: Rationed Meals in the US and TikTok Repels Investments (Too Toxic)
Links for the day
Gemini Links 26/07/2025: "Bloody Google" and New People in Geminispace
Links for the day
Response to Solderpunk (Father of Gemini Protocol) About the Gemini Community
Solderpunk responds to non-sequitur
HTML and the Web Used to be Something a Child Could Learn, "Modern" Web is a Puzzle of Frameworks, Bloat, and Worse
When the Web was more like Gemini Protocol
New US Editor in The Register is 84% Microsoft/Windows Booster
It'll be worrying if it carries on like this
Links 25/07/2025: Slop Blunders and China Has Code of Conduct for Lawmakers in HK
Links for the day
Gemini Links 25/07/2025: Some Books and Babies and Capital
Links for the day
Links 25/07/2025: NOAA Cuts Endanger Lives, "Europe's Self Inflicted Cloud Crisis"
Links for the day
They Try to Lecture Us on Ethics
They even removed "master" from Microsoft GitHub
The Future of the Web is One Rendering Engine or 'Flavours' of Chrome
The future of the Web does not look bright at all
Best Sites Are Not Optimised for Any Browser, They Work Equally Well With All of Them
Red Hat (IBM) is making rubbish sites
YouTube is a Spamfarm, Slopfarm, and Clickfarm (a Lot of Numbers There Are Fake)
Those who don't fake look unpopular and unimportant
We Don't Do JavaScript and Pages Are Small
Thankfully Gemini Protocol has nothing like JavaScript
'Tech' is Not Technology
Some people use terms like 'Old Tech'
IBM's Debt Rose by Almost 10 Billion Dollars in the Past 6 Months Alone
The "hey hi" circus is coming to an end
Yes, Master
Gaslighting by actual racists
Microsoft Bribes and Buys Politicians to Tell Europe What to Do About Free Software (Which It's Attacking)
Microsoft: we speak for the thing that we are attacking! Follow the money...
Making Backups Quickly and Reliably
Backups are imperative, more so in an age of uncertainty, unpredictable weather, and worsening standards (quality of products going down while prices go up)
Techrights Investigation: Estimating the Point in Time LinuxIac Turned Into LLM Slop (Part of the Time)
Bobby Borisov got lazy
10th Month, Ten Weeks From Now, at Ten AM
In Wentworth Institute of Technology in Boston
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, July 24, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, July 24, 2025
A Nadella Memo Distracts From Microsoft's Cheapening Of the Workforce
Right now the "MSM" (mainstream media) is flooded/overwhelmed by garbage pieces that relay lies for Nadella
Vanishing Faces of GNU/Linux
Free software projects do not depend on any one person or company to still exist
Microsoft Says It Lost 400 Million Windows Users, Now It's Waiting for GNU/Linux to Stop Booting on 'Old' PCs
When it comes to Windows, Microsoft is fully aware of the issue and statements it made earlier this summer suggest it lost 400 million Windows users
Slopwatch: LinuxTechLab, linuxsecurity.com, LinuxIac, and More
Also: The Register's Microsoft agenda (new editor)
Gemini Links 25/07/2025: Gemtext Aware Titan Editor and Gemini Protocol Comeback
Links for the day