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RIM Chairman Wants Changes to U.S. Patent Law
florescent_beige writes "The Globe and Mail is reporting that James Balsillie '... called on U.S. lawmakers yesterday to fix a system that he says boxed the company into one of the largest legal settlements in U.S. history.' Although this will do nothing to change the $612.5M(US) settlement RIM was forced to sign with NTP, Mr. Balsille says he wants to help 'assure that no other company experiences what we endured over the past five years.' Mr Balsillie's rhetoric was direct: he said RIM's treatment at trial was like '... a judge in a murder case pondering execution while ignoring DNA evidence that exonerates the accused ... RIM was virtually held up for ransom by NTP...'"
No, that's not quite it...
1) RIM established it's BlackBerry service
2) NTP filed a patent on how it works. (And did not subsequently do ANYTHING with it)
3) NTP contacts RIM to "negotiate" a licensing agreement for NTP's patent (RIM walked away)
4) Lawsuits are filed
5) Patent office invalidates NTP's relevant patents
6) RIM ordered to pay, due to the courts not allowing the testimony of the patent office.
The patent system needs to be reformed. Patents are supposed to protect companies against theft. Patents are not supposed to be a form of revenue.
The way it should work (in my opinion) is that if you want to patent something, you had better have something tangible to present with your filing. In this case, NTP only held a piece of paper saying they invented something. They did not write any code or develop any product (or component of a product). Essentially, there were only three possible sources of revenue for NTP: Investments, Licensing, and Lawsuits.