Intellectual property is a concept in law which points to creations of the mind for which exclusive rights are recognized. According to Bloomberg News, EADS (European Aeronautic Defense and Space Co.) has lost a patent-infringement case it brought against Telecommunications Systems Inc. (TSYS)’s MicroData GIS unit. Court documents revealed on December 20 that ten claims of the patent were not valid and that the jury found no infringement of any claim of the patent.
The patent in dispute covers a method and a system of routing incoming calls through the use of a central data manager. When you have a patent, you have a property right granted by the government. This right to ownership of an idea has been challenged recently, as digital copies of files result in a lot of illegal piracy and seemingly harmless “file sharing.” Unfortunately, this ubiquitous culture of “free” and file sharing has created a nation of people/consumers who may forget that things that they can download aren’t “free.” Indeed no. There is always a cost to be paid one way or the other, either in lost sales, or in lack of monies funneled into R&D in areas that are frequently pirated.
March 2012 Cassidian Communications filed the law suit alleging MicroData infringed patent 6,774,858, which was issued in June 2004. A federal court jury in Marshall, Texas, in an eastern district court, found that MicroData GIS did not infringe on the patent which belongs to the EADS unit Cassidian Communications. Reading these cases, technical specialists who truly understand the patents (especially technology patents) are generally brought in. Finally, the court can narrowly interpret the situation, with the help of those extra details that specify what the patent does, or what its specificities lie in. It would not happen that the court would not understand the situation- in fact in these days, SOPA and PIPA are such giant issues that courts are dealing with these matters more frequently. Juries are also becoming more educated as the news and topics become more prevalent in the news and in everyday life.
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