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German Police Raid 51 CeBIT Stands Over Patent Claims
LeCaddie writes "Last week German investigators raided 51 exhibitor stands at CeBIT, the German information technology fair in Hanover, looking for goods suspected of infringing patents. Some 183 police, customs officers, and prosecutors raided the fair on Wednesday and carried off 68 boxes of electronic goods and documents including cellphones, navigation devices, digital picture frames, and flat-screen monitors. Of the 51 companies raided, 24 were Chinese. Most of the patents concerned were related to devices with MP3, MP4, and DVB standard functions for digital audio and video, blank CDs, and DVD copiers, police said." In the US there are no criminal penalties associated with patents, and such a raid could not be conducted, especially in the absence of a court ruling of infringement.
Yeah, from what I can gather from the various online German news outlets reporting on this the target of the raid was counterfit products, not patent violations. Booths belonging to Chinese companies were selling blatant iPhone ripoffs, like Meizu Technology's "MiniOne", and the police shut them down.
Murphey's fighting Occam, and we're in the stands.
You're ignorant (no offense) if you think the quality of Chinese rip-offs comes close to the real products. I've spent the last two years in Asia, in a country where such fake products are plentiful. I bought a "Sony" discman for part of my stay there. It wasn't so bad since I could just take it to some local, hole-in-the-wall electronics shack and they could fix whatever electronic components had failed while I waited (which occurred fairly regularly), but there is no way any product like that would be put-up with by most Americans, with or without access to a cheap electronic repair outlet. I won't argue with you whether or not real, brand-name electronics have been reduced in quality over the past years (I think they have), but in no way do they approach the shoddy quality (both interior and exterior) of the fake stuff, believe me.
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No, actually you got it wrong. It was acknowledged by law enforcement officials that the raid was about patents. From http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/104657:
Auslöser für die Aktion waren den Angaben der Staatsanwaltschaft zufolge Strafanzeigen der Rechteinhaber. Bei der Razzia sei es vorwiegend um Patente für Datenkompressionsverfahren, DVB-Standards und DVDs gegangen, sagte Kriminaloberrat Oliver Stock, der die Aktion koordiniert hatte und sich über einen "erfolgreichen Abschluss" freute.
Bad translation (by me):
According to the public prosecutors office complaints by holders of rights were reason for the action. Law enforcement senior councillor Oliver Stock who coordinated the action and was glad about the "successfull completion" said target of the raid where mainly patents for data compression, DVB standards and DVDs.
There were some initial (wrong) reports that reason for the raid was counterfeiting (iPhone look-a-likes) but these reports were later corrected, see for example http://www.heise.de/english/newsticker/news/104591 (in english).