IBM lodges Asus patent complaint

IBM wants the US government to ban the imports of Taiwanese OEM manufacturing giant Asustek, claiming the company infringes IBM patents in a broad variety of its tech products.

Asustek, which is best known for manufacturing PCs, notebooks and other products on behalf of big brand companies, has in recent years established it own ASUS brand in a growing number of international markets.

IBM claims it has made “repeated attempts” to reach licensing agreements with Asustek and its subsidiary in the US, ASUS Computer International.

Big Blue has now filed a complaint with the US International Trade Commission outlining three specific breaches concerning patents covering power supply, automatic fan speed control, and computer clustering.

“The infringing Asustek computer products include notebook computers, so-called barebones computer systems, servers, routers and various computer components,” IBM said in a statement.

The US International Trade Commission is an independent federal agency that has the authority to ban the importation of products found to infringe the patents of US companies.

Asustek, which builds products on behalf of companies like Dell and Hewlett Packard, has denied the allegations.

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Judge overturns US$1.5b Microsoft decision

A US judge has thrown out a US$1.5 billion (A$1.74 billion) jury verdict against Microsoft, overturning a ruling that the company had infringed intellectual property owned by telecommunications vendor Alcatel-Lucent.

A San Diego jury in February found that Microsoft had breached two Alcatel-Lucent’s patents related to MP3 music file formats. The jury then awarded Alcatel-Lucent the largest patent damages award in history.

But US District Judge Rudi Brewster, in a 43-page ruling issued on August 6, said the damages sum awarded against Microsoft could not stand because the jury had erred in law and that Microsoft had not infringed one of the two patents.

“The Court finds that the jury's verdict of infringement was against the clear weight of evidence,” Judge Brewster wrote in the court documents.

Microsoft had sought either a reversal of the jury ruling, a drastic reduction in the damages, or a new trial.

“Today's ruling by the judge reversing the jury's $1.52 billion verdict against Microsoft is a victory for consumers of digital music and a triumph for common sense in the patent system,” said Microsoft general counsel Brad Smith.

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