Sony

On March 27, 2012, Graphics Properties Holdings, the remnant of Silicon Graphics Inc., launched a patent infringement suit against Apple, HTC, LG, RIM, Samsung, and Sony. Despite its non-operating status and troll-like activities, Graphics Properties does hold a decent patent portfolio (read: it’s not perfect, but they do hold early priority to widely used display technologies). What does this mean to these defendants, half of which are already suing each other over patent infringement?

Canon and Olympus hold a substantial amount of precedent innovation impacting the nine patents that have been asserted against them recently by Intellectual Ventures. In addition, Intellectual Ventures’ investors hold prior art and precedent innovation which, if disclosed, could vastly alter the enforceability of IV’s patents in suit.

Intellectual Ventures’ investors hold prior art and precedent innovation which, if disclosed, could vastly alter the enforceability of patents asserted in the DRAM industry. We wonder whether their IP holdings or their equity in IV matters more.

On March 18, 2011, Imperium (IP) Holdings filed a lawsuit in the Eastern District of Texas accusing seven companies of infringing five of its patents. Imperium claims that LG, Kyocera, Nokia, Motorola Mobility, Apple, Sony and RIM have all committed infringement by manufacturing, selling or importing cell phones. The asserted patents all relate to image sensors and, in particular, photodiodes. Each of the five patents came to ESS Technology, Inc. as part of its 2003 acquisition of Pictos Technologies, Inc. from Conexant Systems, Inc.