Sendo Sues Orange for Patent Infringement

captnjameskirk writes "RCR Wireless News is reporting that Sendo is suing European carrier Orange for patent infringement involving the circuit board design within the phones. As the article points out, Sendo also sued Microsoft for allegedly stealing their technology for use in the Smartphone OS." Back in January, we also had some more information on the case between Sendo and Microsoft.

Comments

Story so far

[msgmonkey]

Sendo has tech sharing agreement with MS.
Orange has tech sharing agreement with MS.
MS hands over Sendo tech to Orange holds back obligations to Sendo.
Sendo gives up on it's own phone with MS software due to above.
Sendo sues Orange for patent infringement.

So this is n't your average money grabbing patent suit.

Re:Stupid patent system

[Qzukk]

Actually, this wasn't. They had an agreement with MS to take this product to market. Unfortunately they signed a contract with a suicide clause which indicated that if they went under, MS got all their goods. Of course, Microsoft was supposed to pay them to keep them from going under...

So naturally Microsoft didn't pay them, they went under, MS took their stuff, and Sendo sued MS over breach of contract.

Now, at this point, the rights to the technology should be up in the air. If Microsoft broke the terms of the contract by not paying Sendo, then the contract is void and the IP is still Sendo's. But Microsoft, being the arrogant bastard it is, didn't wait for the lawsuit to end, and assumed that they could dole out the big bucks to make sure the suit ended in their favor. So they gave Sendo's IP to Orange to take Sendo's product to market.

So, yes, this is a case of "I will sue anyone who does what my patent describes", but for once, they're justified in biting back.