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Nikola (Motors) is Suing Tesla (engadget.com)
An anonymous reader shares a report: Nikola Tesla invented alternating electrical current. Nikola Motors is a mobility company working on a hydrogen-powered semi truck. Tesla makes fully electric vehicles and last December unveiled its EV Semi. Nikola Motors is suing Tesla Motors over patent infringements, according to Electrek. Nikola alleges that Tesla infringes on three of its patents: fuselage design, a wraparound windshield on a semi truck and a mid-entry door. Nikola claims that these design similarities have "caused confusion" among customers and stolen away over $2 billion in business, and that if problems arise with Tesla's Semi (like battery fires or glitches with autonomous driving), they'll be attributed to Nikola. Typical patent troll stuff.
I'm not sure what the laws on the books are for frivolous patent troll lawsuits, but it would be really beneficial to society if frivolous patent law suits were heavily discouraged by huge fines to the troll perpetrating them.
There is obviously a valid and just use for patents; but there is so much abuse of the system it is ludicrous.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
Hmm, I wonder if a discussion about the President of the USA colluding with Russia's computer hacking attack on the DNC and other American targets is worth of a "News for Nerds" website.
No? Too stupid to talk about hacking that crosses over into treason?
Ok, let's talk about some small-time lawsuit instead.
According to Nikola, Tesla's truck is an impossible scam that will never work. So why bother suing a product that supposedly will never come to market?
The Musk fanboys need to understand that Tesla is not an innovative company.
The patents may or may not be valid, but it is wrong to call Nikola a "patent troll". Patent trolls produce no product and are only a scam to collect money thru the courts. Nikola definitely has a business in this market segment. Please update the post and remove this line.
to complete his personality disorder.
print min(total_sales,claimed_losses);
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Are these design patents? The Blue Jeans Cable case comes to mind here. I suppose they look similar, but how many ways are there to style a semi-truck?
Well, two of these pretty much are the product of wind tunnel testing, aren't they? Pretty much why every sedan looks identical these days?
And, um, moving the location of a door? Is this a patentable invention?
I swear, the USPTO needs to be reined in and stop allowing idiotic patents. Right now their model of "approve everything, collect the money, and let someone else figure out if it was a good patent" is stupid.
The USPTO should be the ones having to defend a patent in court, or at least defend why it was a valid patent in the first place. Put the onus back on them to be competent and thorough instead of just being a rubber-stamp outfit.
So much patent bullshit over the years, all caused by laziness and stupidity on their part.
I remember in the 1960's and 70's that patents were still a good thing. Then came the corrupt (but still booming 80's) Giving birth to lying laws and in the following decades after the birth of the Web as we know it today.. TROLLS. Either make a patent a patent, and nothing more. Or just get RID of them.
Confusion in commerce (whether on the features side or the liabilities side) is a trademark issue. Patents don't provide any protection against that.
Well, I wish Elon would take on these patent trolls like he did the auto dealerships.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
Patent trolls are companies which buy patents, and whose entire business model is to sue other companies for infringement of said patents. If a company is using the patent to actually MAKE something, then it's not, by definition, a patent troll.
Nikola claims that these design similarities have "caused confusion" among customers and stolen away over $2 billion in business,
Doesn't one say "Tesla" and the other "Nikola" on the sides and grilles?
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
I thought the plaintiff is only considered a troll if they have no products using the patented feature or design. From the summary, it sounds like Nikola does use these things. It also sounds as if they might design patents, but that's not pertinent to the question of troll.
Yeah, driving around I've seen all these different but somewhat identical electric semi's and I've been all confused as to who was making them... oh wait... Neither of these companies are actually producing an actual vehicle.
This sounds like trolling of the worst and banal kind.
Yes Francis, the world has gone crazy.
Before Tesla's semi project got off the ground, I heard a radio interview with a Nikola exec about their R&D. If I remember right, the company had chosen 'Nikola' as the name exactly because they were competing in the same electric vehicle space as Tesla was, but for commercial vehicles rather than personal vehicles.
I think Nikola is partly to blame for the confusion they allege, by intentionally choosing a name that is already closely associated with the name Tesla.
I looked at both and they both look like Star Wars Storm Trooper helmets. Both companies are going to lose their design patents to Disney.
Calvin:Do you believe in the devil? Hobbes:I'm not sure man needs the help.
Nothing rises to the level of a utility patent with regard to door placement, windscreen curvature, bodyside skirting on a vehicle. At best they will resort to design patentability. Even then body skirts are prior works known in the trade and obvious to the craft in all three embodiments.
BUT its fabulous exposure and marketing may be able to be patented trading on naming conventions for protection arguing that obvious commonalities are confusing in the marketplace if not the USPTO
X: Did you see the semi truck fire on CNN
Y: Yeah, it had a wrapped around windshield. It must be Nikola
X: Let us not buy Nikola semi in future.
You see, this is why Nikola is losing 2 billion dollar business.
Maybe Tesla could counter-sue to strip them from their company name?
All in all, all this kind of litigation isn't productive at all. Sad really.
At least now we know that "Nikola Motors" is neither now - nor will it ever be - a manufacturer of actual vehicles.
Granted, my breadth of knowledge in various motor industries may be lacking but ... Nikola motors being confused with Tesla ... in general, is a far stretch.
Is 'Tesla Motors', even a trademarked or copyrighted name?
I'll presume 'Nikola Motors' is.
Despite if both are, negative outcomes yet to occur, from 'Tesla' products, being attributed to separate entity, is a broad claim, from patent infringement.
I can't see this going far on that basis.
There may, may not be merit in the individual patent claims, but like everything else, they need to run their course.
And hopefully, not anywhere near East Texas!
This Electrek article show prior art for wrap-around windows and mid entry door. Check the comments and you'll find many others, such as the Volvo Supertruck concept from 2014. The Nikola cab looks way closer to that Volvo than the Tesla cab does to the Nikola.
Fuselage design is just what you get when you stick a semi in a windtunnel and take things one step beyond conventional models. Every 'advanced concept' truck looks like this. And the two designs don't look all that similar beyond the outer mold line.
Wraparound windshield: meh. The idea is old (look at current Scanias for instance), it's just that they usually have the doors further forward.
Which leaves us with the only innovation: the mid-entry door. I don't see truckers enjoying this one, esp. if you're working short haul you don't want to get up, then shuffle a winding path toward the exit. You want the door to be next to the seat.
Thomas (english muffins) is suing Edison.
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Nikola Tesla invented alternating electrical current.
No, Nikola Tesla did not invent alternating electrical current. What he invented was the supply system (three-phase, high-voltage step-up/step-down, etc.), alternating-current, induction motors and improved alternating-current generators. These inventions made the already-known alternating-current viable for creation, distribution and utilization.
I'd never heard of Nikola Motors until now.
Someone once told me there's no such thing as bad publicity.
Usually it's politicians who pull this trick by grandstanding on some "issue"
Another non-journalist who can't understand invention versus discovery.
Tesla's is based off a Storm Trooper and the Nikola one was based off a Cylon. See 2 completely different designs.
We have better fuel economy because no one else is allowed to have a windshield anymore..... ...and my 70's Hot Wheel trucks have 'wrap-around' windshields....
You want to make an electric truck that is aerodynamic and has good driver viability, chances are it is going to be very similar to any other truck that has been designed with the same goals in mind.
http://image.trucktrend.com/f/...
by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
First picture in the June 2016 article looks a lot like both Tesla & Nikola's trucks, when it showed up in 2012:
'This “aerodynamically optimized road train” concept truck from MAN and Krone, both prominent vehicle builders in Europe, was showcased at the 2012 IAA commercial truck show in Hanover, Germany.'
http://www.truckinginfo.com/channel/fuel-smarts/article/story/2016/06/the-future-of-fuel-economy.aspx
Scroll down further and see Peterbuilt's Walmart version.
When you are talking about vehicles getting 7-10 mpg, driving 50k+ miles a year, any and all savings are big.
The CEO of Nikola, a Mr Shorten Cologne, was not available for comment.
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
One can greatly reduce the cost of producing and storing hydrogen by using a little chemistry. Just wrap about 18 hydrogen atoms around 6 or 8 carbon atoms and you have a real convenient liquid fuel with extremely high energy density. Runs great in any ordinary car too. :)
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Nikola Tesla invented alternating electrical current.
No, he didn't. It predated him by a while... what he invented was a practical and brushless (IIRC) motor/generator for alternating current. Prior to his invention, AC was used for the only purpose it could be put, by and large, lighting. (Power pushed through arc lamps.) Probably would have been used for heating as well, if not for the fact that at the time, heating was generally done by burning fuel, so there probably weren't a lot of electric heaters. Prior to this, alternating current was produced in some way, I imagine by reconfiguring a DC generator by manipulating the commutator, or perhaps removing it altogether. BUT there was no way to take the AC power thus generated, and turn it back into motion, which is why it was only used by few, since there was nothing you could do with it but light a place, and then of course it had the advantage of being able to be pushed long distances, but if there's nothing for you to do with it when it gets there, what's the point? At least that's what I'm given to understand about that. But to pretend he "invented" AC current is to misrepresent history of electrical invention and discovery. He invented a great number of things, radio remote control, (and all RC devices descended therefrom,) radio astronomy, (by accident, as I understand it,) and a great many other things, so this is no knock on him, or his inventiveness, but assertions like that take credence away from the rest of the story.
Our reign has gone on long enough. Indeed. Summon the meteors.
Conversely if a Nikola truck goes up in smoke I doubt anyone will confuse it with a Tesla truck.
Aside from that, anyone who has paid attention to trucks, or played truck sim games knows that they're really a product of function over form - the cab is over the engine or behind it. Trucks are designed to largely interchange so vehicles can hitch to and haul different loads.
Capitalism aside I hope these companies came into existence in order to try and solve the worlds dependency on fossil fuels and usher in a new era of using renewables. Petty fighting does nothing to solve these issues and only increases the barrier of entry to those whose conscience is to make the world a better place.
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I've heard of Tesla Motors, but never heard of Nikola Motors. Good thing the brought this suit or I would never have known they existed.
That's not what patent trolling is, but that story post *is* what trolling is.