EMC

Uncited prior art may hinder the strength and defensibility of patents owned by a “back-end deal” entity derived from Intellectual Ventures, currently using these patents in a lawsuit. Following the recent “When Patents Attack” article, we explore the quality of bullets used in the story’s “mafia” reference to see if it’s a real threat or a protection scheme using rubber bullets issued by the USPTO… after all, what Chris Crawford “Invented” was rejected by the Patent Office in 1996 and the patent that was issued was coached into being by a friendly patent examiner!

This week’s Patently Obvious report focuses on the patent holdings of Dot Hill Systems and CommVault Systems. M&A activity in the technology sector continues to be white-hot in the wake of Hewlett-Packard’s acquisition of ArcSight and 3PAR. As in previous weeks, news of imminent rollups in the storage and security sectors has driven further speculation into the identity of the next impending targets.