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Irvine, Calif — Dec 31, `07 /PRNewswire-FirstCall via COMTEX News Network/ — Broadcom announced that a federal judge today issued an injunction against Qualcomm’s continued infringement of three Broadcom patents.

As ordered by US District Court Judge James V. Selna, the injunction prohibits Qualcomm from making, using and selling certain chipsets and software that infringe the three Broadcom patents. Qualcomm is also barred from engaging in a range of marketing and customer support activities related to its WCDMA (Wideband Code Division Multiple Access) and EV-DO (EVolution-Data Only) chips, which are used to process data on high-speed wireless networks.

A Qualcomm spokeswoman said the company was reviewing the ruling and declined further comment. Qualcomm, based in San Diego, is the world’s second-largest chip supplier for mobile phones after Texas Instruments Inc. It earns much of its money from licensing fees on its patented technology.

Broadcom, based in Irvine, California, is a newcomer to the cell phone business but gained ground in 2007 in a wide-ranging court battle with Qualcomm.

In May 2007, a jury awarded Broadcom $19.6 million in damages for the same chip patents. In November, Selna indicated he would up the award to $39.3 million, but reversed himself when a a federal appellate court raised the bar for proving willful patent infringement.

The judge then took up the question of whether future sales of the chips should be stopped, resulting in Monday’s order.

“The ITC order did not go nearly as far in prohibiting other activities from Qualcomm,” said David Rosmann, vice president of intellectual property litigation with Broadcom. “The U.S. District Court order has in some respects much broader remedies. So the activities that are going to be barred by this injunction go a long way to stopping Qualcomm’s continued operations in support of these infringing chips.”

Broadcom is also suing Qualcomm on other patent infringement and antitrust claims, Rosmann said. The antitrust case is expected to go to trial in 2009. More at Broadcom.

HOLMDEL, NJ — Dec 31, `07 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ — Vonage and Nortel today announced that they have agreed in principle to end the litigation pending between them.

The contemplated settlement involves a limited cross license to three Nortel and three Vonage patents and will not call for any monetary payments by any party.

Claims relating to past damages and the remaining patents will be dismissed without prejudice. The settlement is subject to final documentation. More at Vonage.

A federal appeals court handed Google a setback in a patent fight on Wednesday, Dec 26, tossing out part of a summary judgment in Google’s favor in a lawsuit filed by Hyperphrase Technologies.

The US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit revived part of HyperPhrase Technologies’ lawsuit, throwing out a lower court ruling that Google’s AutoLink feature didn’t infringe the company’s patents.

As part of the Google toolbar, AutoLink gives users more information than standard links. It recognizes data such as addresses and book titles, then provides links to online maps or books at Amazon.com.

The appeals court ruled that Google’s immensely profitable AdSense did not infringe on Hyperphrase’s patents. It handed down a split decision on AutoLink, agreeing that Google did not infringe, as claimed, on one of the Hyperphrase patents. But it vacated a summary judgment in Google’s favor on two others and sent it back to the Wisconsin district court.

HyperPhrase claimed in an April 2006 suit that Google used its inventions without permission. It sought cash compensation and an order blocking Mountain View, Calif.-based Google from using the technology.

More at the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruling here (in pdf).

DENVER –BUSINESS WIRE– On Thursday, Dec 20, MPEG LA announced that it has commenced an action against Audiovox for breach of contractual obligations as a Licensee to MPEG LA’s MPEG-2 Patent Portfolio License and 1394 Patent Portfolio License.

According to the complaint filed in the Supreme Court of the State of New York, Audiovox has breached its contractual obligations by failing to report fully its manufacture or sale of products such as DVD players and digital TVs that use the MPEG-2 digital video compression standard or employ the high-speed transfer digital interface provided for in the IEEE 1394 standard, failing to make full payments for its manufacture or sale of such products, and refusing to allow an audit as permitted by the MPEG-2 Contract and 1394 Contract.

MPEG LA seeks, among other things, monetary damages, an order requiring Audiovox to allow the contractually required audit, an accounting of all products manufactured or sold by Audiovox subject to the Contracts, as well as injunctive relief prohibiting Audiovox from the manufacture or sale of MPEG-2 and 1394 products. More at MPEG LA (in pdf).

Brussels — On Thursday, Dec 20, the Protocol Freedom Information Foundation (PFIF), a non-profit organization created by the Software Freedom Law Center, signed an agreement with Microsoft to receive the protocol documentation needed to fully interoperate with the Microsoft Windows workgroup server products and to make them available to Free Software projects such as Samba.

Microsoft was required to make this information available to competitors as part of the European Commission March 24th 2004 Decision in the antitrust lawsuit, after losing their appeal against that decision on September 17th 2007.

After paying Microsoft a one-time sum of 10,000 Euros, the PFIF will make available to the Samba Team under non-disclosure terms the documentation needed for implementation of all of the workgroup server protocols covered by the EU decision.

Although the documentation itself will be held in confidence by the PFIF and Samba Team engineers, the agreement allows the publication of the source code of the implementation of these protocols without any further restrictions. This is fully compatible with versions two and three of the GNU General Public License (GPL). Samba is published under the GNU GPL which is the most widely used of all Free Software licenses. In addition it allows discussion of the protocol information amongst implementers which will aid technical cooperation between engineers.

Under the agreement, Microsoft is required to make available and keep current a list of patent numbers it believes are related to the Microsoft implementation of the workgroup server protocols, without granting an implicit patent license to any Free Software implementation.

No per-copy royalties are required from the PFIF, Samba developers, third party vendors or users and no acknowledgement of any patent infringement by Free Software implementations is expressed or implied in the agreement. More at Samba.

San Jose, Calif — Dec 19, `07 - eBay today released the following statement regarding its District Court victory in the Netcraft vs eBay and PayPal patent infringement case.

On December 18, 2007, the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Wisconsin entered judgment, granting eBay’s and PayPal’s motion for summary judgment of non-infringement on both of the patents that Netcraft asserted against eBay and PayPal.

“We are pleased by the Court’s well-reasoned ruling in this case. We will continue to protect the interests of our global community of users and the businesses who rely on eBay’s platforms to make a living.”

In May 2007, Netcraft brought suit against eBay and PayPal and contended that PayPal’s payment services infringe two of Netcraft’s patents titled “Internet Billing Method.” The Court ruled that all of the patents in question require “providing customers with internet access” and because eBay and PayPal do not provide customers with internet access, the two companies do not infringe Netcraft’s patents.

CAMBRIDGE, Mass –BUSINESS WIRE– Dec 19, `07 — Bitstream today announced today that the US Patent and Trademark Office has awarded the company a third patent for its ThunderHawk technology.

This patent covers the technology that controls how web pages are retrieved and displayed on mobile devices, and is the foundation of the company’s ThunderHawk product. ThunderHawk is the first browser to provide a consistent, full HTML browsing experience between mobile and desktop environments.

The issued patent covers technology that displays digital content, such as a Web site, by accessing it, laying it out at a virtual pixel resolution, and then displaying a portion of that layout at a smaller display resolution. This displays the layout’s images and text at a scaled-down resolution size, with displayed text composed from font bitmaps having character shapes, sizes, and pixel alignments selected to improve readability at the scaled-down size. More at Bitstream.

BRUSSELS, Belgium — Dec 18, `07 — Software maker Platform Solutions has filed a complaint with the European Commission alleging that IBM abused its market dominance by refusing to share information related to its high- performance mainframe computers.

The complaint, filed on Oct 19, according to a European Commission spokesman Jonathan Todd, is the latest in an ongoing intellectual property dispute between privately held Platform Solutions and IBM Corp.

Platform Solutions alleges that IBM abused EU antitrust rules “by refusing to supply interface information relating to mainframe computers and refusing to license third parties,” Todd said.

IBM and Platform Solutions have sued each other in the US over related intellectual-property and antitrust issues. The EU filing follows a European court ruling in September upholding a decision against Microsoft that it abused its dominant position by failing to help competitors connect to the Windows operating system.

In December 2006, IBM sued Platform Solutions charging that the company, which manufactures software that can run on IBM’s high-end systems, violated patents IBM holds on some of its operating systems.

In January Platform Solutions filed its own US suit accusing IBM of refusing to supply its operating systems to customers who buy Platform Solutions’s IBM- compatible mainframe computer. Platform Solutions also accused IBM of “unreasonably discontinuing” its licensing of intellectual-property rights.

On Friday, Dec 14, Nortel Networks, the Canadian maker of telecom equipment, filed a lawsuit against Vonage - claiming that it violated nine patents related to Internet phone services and related features such as 911 and 411 calling and ‘Click to Call’.

Vonage was dragged into the legal battle after it acquired three patents from Digital Packet Licensing last year, according to Vonage spokesman Charles Sahner. DPL had filed a suit against Nortel in 2004 alleging violation of those three patents, so Vonage continued with the lawsuit.

“Litigation is ongoing, and both parties have filed - and will continue to file - papers supporting their case,” Sahner said. On the possibility of a settlement, he said: “We always prefer to settle disputes amicably whenever possible.”

In this particular case, Vonage is pursuing the legal action, rather than getting sued. Sahner said Nortel’s countersuit was a defensive move.

In October, Vonage settled the last of its lawsuits with the major U.S. telecom companies. Throughout the year, it had fended off legal actions by Verizon, AT&T, and Sprint Nextel.

On Wednesday, Dec 12, Sharp Corporation filed a patent infringement lawsuit against Samsung Electronics in the Seoul Central District Court in South Korea.

The complaint alleges that (1) liquid crystal display (LCD) modules manufactured and/or sold by Samsung in South Korea and (2) LCD TVs manufactured and/or sold by Samsung in South Korea that incorporate these LCD modules infringe upon three LCD-related Korean patents that are owned by Sharp.

In the complaint, Sharp requests that the Court award it compensatory damages and prohibit the manufacturing and sale of the infringing products in South Korea.

The three patents named in the lawsuit are Korean Patent Numbers 371,939, 740,570 and 776,988. These patents relate to LCD technologies that achieve high brightness and high-speed response, as well as a wide viewing angle by regulating and stabilizing the alignment of the LCD molecules.

On August 6, 2007, Sharp filed a patent infringement lawsuit against Samsung and its US subsidiaries Samsung Electronics America, Inc. (SEA) and Samsung Telecommunications America (STA) in the US. That lawsuit is now pending. More at Sharp.

San Jose, Calif — Dec 12, ‘07 — eBay released the following statement in response to the December 11, 2007 District Court ruling in the MercExchange v. eBay case.

“We are disappointed with the court’s order and we plan to appeal it. In its ruling, the court concluded that it did not have the legal right to consider the merits of our arguments concerning the ‘265 patent, but rather was required to reject our motions based on the procedural posture of the case. We intend to appeal the Court’s ruling on the procedural issues and remain confident that after the appeal, the Court will consider our arguments on their merits.

“Additionally, our motion for summary judgment that our 2003 design-around was effective and there is no ongoing infringement of the ‘265 patent, and that no further damages are due, also remains pending before the court.

“We remain pleased with other developments in this ongoing case, including the decision by the United States Court of Appeals to invalidate another patent in this case; the May 2006 unanimous Supreme Court decision in eBay’s favor on MercExchange’s request for an injunction; and the District Court’s subsequent affirmation in September 2007 that no injunction is called for. We look forward to the opportunity to appeal yesterday’s District Court ruling.”

Tuesday’s ruling by Judge Jerome Friedman stems from a jury’s 2003 verdict finding eBay and eBay subsidiary Half.com liable for $35 million for intentionally infringing two MercExchange patents. The US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit later reduced the award to $25.5 million.

Friedman in July denied eBay’s request to stay proceedings on one of the patents, governing eBay’s so-called “Buy It Now” feature that allows users to buy an item outright at a given price without bidding for it.

Friedman said in July the US Supreme Court’s 2006 ruling sending the case back to the trial court for further action had no bearing on the jury’s 2003 verdict. More at eBay.

White Plains, NY — Dec 12, ‘07 — Nokia announced today that a United States International Trade Commission (ITC) judge issued an Initial Determination in favor of Nokia in the action brought by Qualcomm against Nokia alleging patent infringement.

The judge found no infringement or violation by Nokia of the three asserted Qualcomm patents. In addition, it was determined that patent ‘473 was found to be invalid.

Qualcomm filed its complaint on June 9, 2006 alleging infringement by Nokia of six Qualcomm patents. Prior to the hearing, which began on September 10, 2007, Qualcomm voluntarily withdrew three of the six patents from its complaint. The remaining three patents relate to an invention Qualcomm claims it made when developing CDMA technology. Qualcomm declared the three remaining patents as essential to the GSM standard and subsequently attempted to withdraw its declaration on one of those patents.

Similar patents, relating to CDMA inventions, are at issue in the European and China cases filed by Qualcomm against Nokia.

Qualcomm has yet to prevail in any patent litigation action against Nokia despite it having filed 11 lawsuits around the world over the past two years.

The judge’s Initial Determination will now be forwarded to the full Commission for review. The Commission is scheduled to make its Final Determination by April 14, 2008. More at Nokia, Qualcomm.

Related:

Qualcomm Wins Another Round in Patent Battles with Nokia

Another Round of Qualcomm vs Nokia Patent Battle Starts in Britain

The so-called “Gift Order Patent” has been revoked by the EPO, On Dec 07, ‘07, in an opposition proceeding today after a hearing involving three opposing parties and the patent proprietor, Amazon. The patent relates to a method for purchasing goods over the Internet to be sent as gifts.

The contested patent is European Patent EP 0 927 945, granted to Amazon Inc. on 23 April 2003. This patent relates to an invention in the field of computer-implemented inventions (CII). It specifies a method by which a person can purchase a product as a gift and have it shipped based on the e-mail address of the recipient. Based on this e-mail address, the system will then contact the recipient to obtain a valid postal address for shipping. This patent is not to be confused with the “One-Click” patent application, which was withdrawn after the first EPO examination and never granted in Europe.

The parties who have lodged opposition against the patent – all of whom were represented at the hearing – are Fleurop Interflora Businesses and two non-government organisations in the IT field, namely the German Society of Information Sciences, and the Foundation for Free Information Infrastructure (FFII).

One of the opposition’s main arguments against the patent – among others – was that it fell short of meeting the criteria of providing an “inventive step”, as defined in Article 56 of the European Patent Convention (EPC). On these grounds, the three opposing parties asked for the patent to be revoked.

The European Patent Office as an intergovernmental executive institution is not itself a party to this case. The EPO’s Opposition Division acts as an independent arbiter and issues rulings in conformity with the European Patent Convention and the applicable international and European law. More at EPO.

Lawsuit Claims Verizon Illegally Distributes Open Source Software to FiOS Customers.

Dec 07, ‘07 –The Software Freedom Law Center (SFLC) today announced that it has filed a copyright infringement lawsuit against Verizon Communications, Inc. on behalf of its clients, two principal developers of BusyBox, alleging violation of the GNU General Public License (GPL). BusyBox is a lightweight set of standard Unix utilities commonly used in embedded systems and is open source software licensed under GPL version 2.

Verizon is the provider of a fiber-optic Internet and television service called FiOS. Verizon distributes Actiontec MI424WR wireless routers to FiOS customers. This router contains BusyBox, and under the terms of the GPL, Verizon is obligated to provide the source code of BusyBox to recipients of the device. According to the lawsuit, Verizon continues to distribute BusyBox illegally without source code, despite having been contacted by SFLC.

The complaint requests that an injunction be issued against Verizon and that damages and litigation costs be awarded to the plaintiffs. A copy of the complaint, as filed yesterday in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, is available at http://www.softwarefreedom.org/news/2007/dec/07/busybox/verizon.pdf

“Our clients licensed BusyBox under the GPL to ensure that all users of the program can access and modify its source code,” said Dan Ravicher, Legal Director of SFLC. “Because Verizon chose not to respond to our concerns, we had no choice but to file a lawsuit to ensure that they comply with the GPL.”

This is the fourth GPL enforcement lawsuit filed by SFLC on behalf of BusyBox developers Erik Andersen and Rob Landley. Defendants in previous cases have included Monsoon Multimedia, High Gain Antennas, and Xterasys Corporation. The case against Monsoon Multimedia was settled out of court in October, with Monsoon agreeing to remedy its prior violation, ensure future compliance, and financially compensate the plaintiffs. SFLC.

TOKYO, Japan — Dec 07, ‘07 — Japan-Today is reporting on Toshiba corp is being sued by a former employee  for about 260 million yen ($2.34 million) in remuneration for the profits the firm reaped from the basic technologies he invented for Japanese language word processing software.

Japan-Today further writes, “Shinya Amano, who is now a professor at the Shonan Institute of Technology, said in his written complaint that although the firm obtained patents for the technologies in conjunction with him and three others, and paid him tens of thousands yen annually in remuneration, he actually developed the technologies alone. He is claiming 10% of an estimated profit of 2.6 billion yen earned by the firm in 1996 and 1997, compared with the roughly 230,000 yen he actually received in the two years.” Japan-Today.

SEATTLE –BUSINESS WIRE– Dec 06, ‘07 — Typhoon Touch Technologies announced today that it has commenced an action against Dell and Motion Computing for patent infringement. The Complaint seeks damages and a permanent injunction enjoining Dell and Motion Computing from continued infringing activity.

The Complaint was filed on Wednesday in the United States District Court, Eastern District of Texas, Tyler Division, Case No. 6:07-cv-546. Typhoon commenced the action as co-plaintiff with its licensee, Nova Mobility Systems.

Typhoon’s complaint alleges that Motion Computing and Dell have infringed and continue to infringe its U.S. Patent No. 5,379,057 issued January 3, 1995 and entitled “Portable Computer with Touch Screen and Computer System Employing Same,” and U.S. Patent No. 5,675,362 issued October 7, 1997 and entitled “Portable Computer with Touch Screen and Computing System Employing Same,” through various actions including the manufacturing, selling, offering for sale, and/or importing a variety of portable computer products, including but not limited to tablet PCs, slate PCs, handheld PCs, personal digital assistants (PDAs), ultra mobile PCs (UMPCs), smart phones, and/or other products covered by the patents-in-suit. More at BusinessWire.

ARMONK, NY — Dec 06 ‘07 — IBM today announced it has filed a complaint against ASUSTeK (based in Taiwan) and its North American subsidiary, ASUS Computer International, with the United States International Trade Commission. The complaint details the infringement of IBM patents by certain ASUSTeK computer products and components, and requests an exclusion order against the importation of infringing ASUSTeK computer products and components into the United States.

IBM has made repeated attempts to reach a licensing agreement between the companies. IBM’s position has been — and remains — that ASUSTeK either must license or stop using IBM’s patented technology.

IBM’s complaint identifies three patents that are infringed by ASUSTeK products imported into the U.S. These three patents cover important aspects of computer systems, including power supplies, computer cooling and computer clustering capabilities. The infringing ASUSTeK computer products include notebook computers, so-called barebones computer systems, servers, routers and various computer components.

The specific patents asserted in the IBM complaint are:

1. U.S. Patent No. 5,008,829: Personal computer power supply
2. U.S. Patent No. 5,249,741: Automatic fan speed control
3. U.S. Patent No. 5,371,852: Method and apparatus for making a cluster of computers appear as a single host on a network

The United States International Trade Commission is an independent federal agency with authority to bar the importation of products that infringe US patents. More at IBM.

NEW YORK –BUSINESS WIRE– Dec 03, ‘07 — Klausner Technologies announced today that it has filed patent lawsuits under its visual voicemail patents against Comcast, Cablevision and eBay’s Skype with damages and future royalties estimated at $300 million.

The lawsuit asserts that the above companies’ VOIP voicemail products and services infringe Klausner Technologies’ U.S. Patent 5,572,576. The patent has already been licensed to various other companies which provide the same visual voice messaging services, including Time Warner’s AOL for its AOL Voicemail services, Vonage Holdings for its Vonage Voicemail Plus services as well as others, under the Klausner Patents.

Cablevision’s Optimum Voicemail, Comcast’s Digital Voice Voicemail and eBay’s Skype Voicemail each violate Klausner’s intellectual property rights by allowing users to selectively retrieve and listen to voice messages via message inbox displays.

Against Apple:
Klausner Technologies also announced today that it has filed a patent lawsuit under its visual voicemail patents against Apple on the iPhone, with damages and future royalties estimated at $360 million.

The lawsuit asserts that Apple’s iPhone Visual Voicemail infringes Klausner Technologies’ U.S. Patents 5,572,576 and 5,283,818.
Klausner Technologies was founded by Judah Klausner, the inventor of the PDA and electronic organizer. Apple’s original groundbreaking PDA, the Newton, was, in fact, covered under an OEM patent license granted by Judah Klausner over twenty years ago under his landmark US Patent 4,117,542.

The iPhone violates Klausner’s intellectual property rights by allowing users to selectively retrieve voice messages via the iPhone’s inbox display. Apple has called iPhone’s Visual Voicemail “one of the greatest advances in the history of mankind … without question.”

Against AT&T:
Klausner Technologies further announced today that it has filed a patent lawsuit under its visual voicemail patents against AT&T for selling the Apple iPhone, its Visual Voicemail service and other visual voice messaging services, with damages and future royalties estimated at $360 million.

The lawsuit asserts that sales of Apple’s iPhone, Visual Voicemail and other visual voice messaging services implemented by AT&T infringe Klausner Technologies’ U.S. Patents 5,572,576 and 5,283,818.

All three suits have been filed by the California law firm of Dovel & Luner in a federal court in the Eastern District of Texas.

ALVISO, Calif — Nov 29, ‘07 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ — TiVo offered the following statement today on the United States Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) decision with respect to the reexamination of TiVo’s Multimedia Timewarping System patent, U.S. patent number 6,233,389 (the “Time Warp Patent”):

“We are extremely pleased that the PTO has now found all claims of the Time Warp Patent to be valid after conducting a reexamination of the patent requested by EchoStar. This decision by the PTO is final and not appealable by EchoStar. Today’s decision by the PTO brings us another step closer to ending EchoStar’s continued infringement and we are hopeful that the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit will uphold the district court judgment of patent infringement and reinstate the injunction.” More at PRNewsWire.

STOCKHOLM — Nov 28, ‘07 — Nokia could experience delays or holdups in its smartphone strategy if rival Apple goes on the defensive to protect its intellectual property rights regarding the touch-screen iPhone, says Steve Goldstein of Marketwatch.

He further writes, “”I think Apple will likely view Nokia as infringing on its user interface patents,” said London-based Nomura analyst Richard Windsor Wednesday. “But I don’t see this being the same scale of (the) legal battle Nokia has with Qualcomm IWindsor said. He said Nokia is likely working on an overhaul of its s60 platform, to be ready in the second half of 2008, a move that will feature touch.

He said Apple claims to have filed at least 200 patents relating to the touch screen user interface on the iPhone and is likely to protect them. He said Apple and Nokia would be more likely to end up in an agreement in 2009 rather than slugging it out in the courts.” More at MarketWatch.

London, UK — Nov 26, ‘07 — The world’s top cellphone maker, Nokia Oyj, said on Monday it was confident it had not infringed the two technology patents U.S. chipmaker Qualcomm had sued it for in Britain.The hearing of the case, originally filed by Qualcomm in May last year, got underway at the High Court in London today.

Qualcomm is seeking an injunction that would stop Nokia selling products using the patents in Britain. It was unclear which Nokia products would be affected. Qualcomm has sued Nokia over the same or similar GSM patents also in the United States, Germany, France, Italy and China. None of the cases has reached a verdict or settlement.

“Nokia is confident the facts and the evidence presented at trial will clearly and definitively demonstrate that Qualcomm’s alleged GSM patents are invalid and not infringed,” Nokia spokeswoman Anne Eckert said.

The companies have been at legal loggerheads since they failed to renew a key technology licensing pact that expired on April 9. Analysts have estimated Nokia pays around $500 million to Qualcomm annually for patents and wants to cut the sum.

Last week Qualcomm won a round in a different battle with Nokia as a U.S. trade court tossed out a lawsuit asking for Qualcomm chips to be barred from the United States due to pending arbitration and another round at the District Court in The Hague on Nov 14.

IRVINE, Calif — Nov 23, ‘07 — Chip maker Broadcom said Friday it will try to stop rival Qualcomm from making, using, selling or developing cellular chips based on contested patents.

It’s the latest legal cannonball hurled by Broadcom in its wide-ranging court battle with industry Goliath Qualcomm over the rights to technology for cell phones.

The move comes two days after Broadcom chose to accept a reduced damage award of $19.6 million rather than retry its case against Qualcomm in a California federal court.

U.S. District Court Judge James V. Selna initially indicated he would award Broadcom $39.3 million in damages, double what a jury awarded in May. The panel found that Qualcomm willfully violated three of Broadcom’s patents on technologies that help cell phones process video and walkie-talkie conversations and hand off calls between different networks.

Selna overturned his own ruling after a federal appellate court raised the bar for proving patent infringement. That ruling came in a dispute between an individual investor and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology against Seagate Technology, the world’s largest maker of hard drives.

Broadcom spokesman Bill Blanning said the company was glad Selna allowed the original jury verdict to stand and hoped he would grant the company’s request for an injunction on Qualcomm’s production of third-generation WCDMA and EV-DO cellular chips.

Qualcomm plans to ask the judge to approve a system of royalty payments by its customers to Broadcom in lieu of ordering an injunction, said spokeswoman Christine Trimble. Earlier this year, Verizon Wireless agreed to pay Broadcom $6 for each phone with a patent-infringing Qualcomm chip — up to $40 million a quarter or $200 million over the life of the agreement.

Qualcomm, based in San Diego, is the world’s second-largest chip supplier for mobile phones after Texas Instruments but earns much of its money from licensing fees on its patented technology. Broadcom, based in Irvine, is a newcomer to the cell phone business but has scored several legal victories against Qualcomm this year.

Qualcomm is also embroiled in several legal battles with leading mobile phone maker Nokia. They are currently in arbitration proceedings after failing to renew a technology license agreement that expired in April. More at Broadcom.

Just a week after the District Court in The Hague dismissed a complaint filed by Nokia seeking to limit Qualcomm’s intellectual property rights, on Wednesday, November 21 Qualcomm won another round in its patent battles with wireless phone maker Nokia, as a US trade court tossed out a lawsuit asking for Qualcomm’s chips to be barred from the United States.

The U.S. International Trade Commission dropped the Nokia lawsuit due to pending arbitration, the commission said. “The case is finished at the ITC,” said ITC staffer John Greer.

Nokia had alleged infringement of patents on technology that made its telephones smaller and more efficient. Nokia had requested the ITC bar the importation of the infringing chips.

An ITC administrative law judge granted Qualcomm’s motion to dismiss the suit on October 18. Nokia protested, requesting a review of the decision, but the commission upheld it.

Alex Rogers, Qualcomm’s senior vice president, legal counsel, said Nokia had been barred from filing patent lawsuits against Qualcomm because of arbitration underway in Los Angeles.

The arbitration petition was filed in April, Rogers said in a telephone interview, while ITC documents show the trade court opened its investigation into the Nokia suit in September. “From our point of view, Nokia is not entitled to sue Qualcomm for patent infringement,” Rogers said.

There are more than a dozen lawsuits pending between Nokia and Qualcomm on three continents.

SANTA ROSA, CA –Marketwire– Nov 21, ‘07 — Burst.com today announced today that it has signed an agreement in principle to settle its case against Apple ending almost 2 years of litigation. Apple agreed to pay Burst a one-time payment of $10 million cash in exchange for a non-exclusive license to Burst’s patent portfolio, not including one issued U.S. patent and 3 pending U.S. patent applications related to new DVR technology. Burst agreed not to sue Apple for any future infringement of the DVR patent and any patents that might issue from the pending DVR-related applications.

The $10 million patent license provides Apple with the right to use Burst’s intellectual property in its own technology and products, without further consideration. Burst, however, retains the right to enforce its patent portfolio against others.

Court costs, expenses and attorney’s fees in connection with the settlement of the litigation with Apple will reduce proceeds to the Company to approximately $4.6 million. According to the agreement, payment to Burst is to be made promptly after signing of a definitive settlement agreement. Burst’s Board of Directors has indicated that it will be considering a cash distribution to Burst’s shareholders from the Apple license fee, in an amount to be determined. More at MarketWire, Court Order Notice at Burst.com

On Nov 15 a U.S. Appeals Court has denied Vonage’s appeal of a patent-infringement loss to Verizon Communications. The court action means the Voice Over Internet Protocol (VOIP) provider Vonage must pay Verizon $117.5 million, rather than $80 million.

Vonage settled the infringement suit on Oct. 25 after Verizon won both a jury verdict and an appeal in the case. The accord left open the amount to be paid until the appeals court decided whether to grant Vonage’s request for reconsideration.

Vonage had asked the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit to review its ruling, or have the full 12-judge court reconsider the Sept. 26 decision in favor of Verizon. That request was denied today in an order posted on the court’s Web site.

“We were not surprised, but disappointed that the court denied our request for a rehearing of the case,” Vonage spokesman Charlie Sahner said. “We are pleased to continue putting litigation behind us.”

Vonage wanted the court to review a decision that upheld most of a March verdict, which found that the company had violated two Verizon patents. The jury from that trial awarded Verizon a 5.5 percent royalty on future income. The amount owed to Verizon had grown to about $88 million when Vonage announced the settlement.

Under the terms of the settlement, the $120 million payment would have been cut to $80 million had the appeals court in Washington agreed to review the decision. Holmdel, New Jersey- based Vonage must pay $117.5 million to Verizon and give $2.5 million to charity.

Vonage has settled with Verizon, Sprint, and AT&T over patent infringement claims.