CSIRO Wins Wi-Fi Patent Appeal
After an appeal in the US Eastern District of Texas Court, it turns out Buffalo Technology still can't sell you a router in the United States
CSIRO Wins Wi-Fi Patent Appeal
After an appeal in the US Eastern District of Texas Court, it turns out Buffalo Technology still can't sell you a router in the United States
Sigh. Reading through the 40 page decision at:
I find that the only claim against prior art and previous disclosure was that the author of a 1989 article did not clearly specify that ODFM was to be used for indoor use. Hair splitting at its best. All the other claims of prior art were acknowledged by CSIRO. Pg 12: "The only limitation of the asserted independent claims that the district court found not to be disclosed in Rault was the ?in a confined multipath transmission environment? (i.e., indoor environment) limitation..."
I'm also wondering about Buffalo's expert. Pg 15: "CSIRO cites the declaration of its expert, Dr. Bantz, who stated that in his work on wireless LANs at IBM, the use of OFDM ?was almost immediately dismissed . . . as unsuitable for an indoor wireless environment.?"
In reading the decision, I agree with the judge that Buffalo's OFDM products do infringe on the patent. The only questions are whether the patent is invalidated due to prior art and whether CSIRO modifications to the patent, in an obvious attempt to expand its scope, constitutes ground for invalidation. I don't know the answer to those. The judge thinks they don't.
Well, I guess I get to boycott products from Australia as the CSIRO is a government operated organization.
I'm wondering what they hope to accomplish with this litigation. Are there any Wi-Fi manufactories in Australia that need protecting?
Give you Yanks a taste of your own medicine :-)
Wasn't exporting Forster's and Dundee revenge enough?
That would be fair if it were an Australian court that decided against the US/Japan company. However, it was a Texas court that did it (twice). Buffalo is based in Austin Texas. We did it to ourselves.
Incidentally, the same case was tried in Nov 2007 in Japan and predictably Buffalo, a Japanese company, won.
I still don't have a clue what Australia plans to accomplish by undermining the entire wi-fi industry.
"Entire"? I thought Cisco had a licence through their acquisition of Radiata.
Good point. I suppose the other OFDM wirleess vendors are suppose to line up and sign license agreements with CSIRO now. Or, they could form some manner of alliance, build up a legal war chest, and press for a common defense. Dunno.
Radiata was originally a spinoff of CSIRO. Founded in 1997, bought by Cisco in 2000, shut down by Cisco in 2005. I suspect CSIRO might be a bit irate about this.
CSIRO also gets my award for greed. In 2005, they originally were asking a $4/chip license fee for use of the ODFM patent. That's about
75% of the total cost of the chip at the time, which is very much on the hight side. No clue what they're asking this week.In 2004, the plot thickens somewhat with the patent suit against Cisco and its Radiata ODFM license, when Wi-LAN a patent holding and litigation company, sued.
Perhaps that was the inspiration for Cisco shutting down Radiata. Dunno.
However, none of this answers my original question. Why would a government owned and operated research organization ask what appears to be intentionally unreasonable license terms and apparently (my guess) resort to litigation when the terms are not met?
Has anyone actually admitted what has been asked for a license? I have only seen speculation from $3 to $10 per item,final product. CSIRO don't seem to have gone after any chip manufacturers only final product manufacturers so if it was $4 per item,final product, that would probably equate to an extra $10 retail on the final product by the time the manufacturers had added their percentages to pay for the licence and their inconvenience.
According to their website: "Every transaction is different and each is structured to ensure that it meets the needs of all parties."
Look what the cat dragged in - Jeff Liebermann:
Why do The CSIRO's licens terms for their ODFM patent appear intentionally unreasonable for you?
Sorry, I goofed. I meant license royalties, not terms. The only numbers I've seen are the $4 per chips for a chip that costs about $3/ea (without royalties) in 2005. Todays asking price may be different. I can speculate that if CSIRO had asked for reasonable royalties from Cisco and others, they may have paid, especially if the license fees were less than the litigation.
However, now that you mention terms, I notice that CSIRO has become a partner in various ventures in exchange for licensing their technology. I don't consider that unreasonable, but it's possible that only startups will find such an arrangement tolerable. Larger companies might consider exchanging stock for licenses, but that apparently isn't in the CSIRO game plan. My guess(tm) is that the current asking price for license fees was sufficiently high to preclude any licensing, even when translated into a stock exchange.
"CSIRO's partnering arrangements, such as licensing, have led to us having an equity shareholding in more than 20 companies."
NotMe:
The secret to drinking Foster's is
- drink it when you're thirsty and it's hot outside
- drink it very cold - from a glass kept in the fridge.
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