Rating: Battle of the US patents over QR codes warms up
This simply cannot be a co-incidence. On exactly the same day [April 10th 2012] that QR/3D barcode specialist – NeoMedia Technologies announced that it is suing a rival firm, the company in question – SpyderLynk declares that it has finally received a patent on its own technology. Curiously, NeoMedia originally claimed that it was suing SpyderLynk over three different patents. Mysteriously, after an intervention by NeoMedia’s Press relations people, GoMobile News agreed to pull any references to NeoMedia’s 7,765,126 patent which was originally mentioned.So what are we going to see next? SpyderLynx counter suing over its own 8,094,870 US patent?
Let’s put this whole thing into perspective. SpyderLynx has managed to obtain a patent on ‘Encoding and decoding data in an image’ for its SnapTag 2D mobile barcode technology.
GoMobile News has questioned whether this dispute will ever extend out of North America.
As we said in this previous story, we’re not convinced SpyderLynk could get a patent on its technology in Europe.
Anyway, here’s a foretaste of things to come, enter Nicole Skogg, SpyderLynk’s CEO.
She observed, “With the successful patent approval, we will be diligent in defending our technology to protect the investment of all our stakeholders, who’ve been great supporters of our business model and champions of our technology.”
She continued, “By securing the US patent for SnapTag, our solution is now officially recognised for its unique value and as a key differentiator in the marketplace.”
GoMobile News just knows that this whole thing is set to get very messy, indeed.
Interesting timing wouldn’t you say?
http://itbriefing.net/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=275748
“The U.S. patent was issued to SpyderLynk on January 10, 2012.”
I wonder why they are issuing this PR today?
Oh right, they’re getting sued by NeoMedia for patent infringement.
Damage control much
The exact phrase was “announced its receipt of U.S. Patent No. 8,094,870″. So it hasn’t exactly been sitting on the news since January 10th 2012.
NeoMedia’s 7,765,126 was never included in the complaint. Hard to believe they didn’t know this?
The 8,131,597 patent actually in the complaint was issued on March 06, 2012.
The only patent remaining in the complaint is the infamous ‘048 patent that NeoMedia used in previous suits.
NeoMedia’s infamous ’048 patent has survived two USPTO patent reexaminations.
Time for SpyderLynk to take a license.