Bright LCD Patent Dispute

pcp_ip writes "Honeywell filed suit Wednesday against 34 companies (including, Apple, Dell, Sony, Kodak, Fuji et al.) for infringment of patent 5,280,371. The patent for "a directional diffuser for a liquid crystal display" was filed on January 1994 and enables "a display to produce a brighter image without requiring additional power." Honeywell is looking for an injunction to prevent the defendants from continuing to infringe its patent, and for "damages adequate to compensate them for Defendants infringement." So much for LCD prices coming down! Where's OLED when you need it?"

Comments

But...

[ivan256]

Apple and Dell don't even make LCD panels... All they do OEM panels from various manufacturers and put them in a plastic housing with some accessory electronics...

Surely it would be the manufacturer that's infringing, right?

Valid patent for once

[eagl]

Maybe I'm going against the grain here, but I am pleased to see a patent for an actual physical implementation of a technology being defended, instead of all the bogus so-called "software patents" we've been hearing about for the last few years. Some patents are quite reasonable and legit, but with all the st00pid bogus patents getting all the press lately even legit patents are getting a bad rap.

Kudos for Honeywell, a company you don't hear about throwing it's weight around all the time, defending a patent that describes a process and physical implementation that actually DOES something. If they'd patented a method for vertical alignment of viewing sensors in front of a display apparatus to maximize contrast and enhance look-angle (ie. the up-down adjustment on your office chair), then we'd have reason to throw rotten fruit, but this patent seems to be a legitimate technological concept.

Give them a break... Rightous patents should be defended rigorously or there is no incentive to do core research. Don't let the flood of worthless patents or the incompetence of the patent examiners destroy the legitimate use of the patent system.

Re:Karma for Kodak

[dougmc]

To be fair, Kodak probably learned about patents first hand when Polaroid sued them (and won $900 million). Then, to add insult to injury, since Kodak couldn't make film for their instant cameras anymore, they had to spend about $500 million more dollars paying off those who had bought them.

Ouch.

Though I expect that Sun will ultimately prevail when they appeal this case. Still, the only real winners when patents get involved are the lawyers.

Re:Yet another example of patent BS.

[micromoog]

The "obvious" solution to the brightness problem is brighter lightbulbs, not an array of lenses and other optics.

Ever looked inside a flashlight?

Innovation

[Ender Ryan]

Furthermore, everyone I know who had one of Kodak's instant cameras thought they were much, much better than Poloroid.

So much for innovation, eh?

And now, Kodak sues Sun similarly. The abused becomes another abuser. The circle continues.