OPTi Up on Favorable Patent Ruling Against Apple

OPTi (OPTI.OB), a technology licensing company with a market cap of less than $25 million and only one full time employee (per Yahoo!) is taking on Goliath, and winning.

In a ruling issued Friday in its patent lawsuit against Apple, the court:

• granted OPTi’s summary judgment motion that Apple’s (AAPL) accused products infringe the patent at suit (good for OPTi);
• denied Apple’s cross-motion for summary judgment that its products do not infringe the patents-in-suit (good for OPTi);
• denied Apple’s motion seeking summary judgment that OPTi was entitled to no pre-suit damages for certain products (ruling that whether OPTi had given Apple proper notification of infringement on those products is a question for the jury to decide) (good for OPTi);
• granted in part and denied in part Apple’s motion seeking to exclude the opinions of OPTi’s damages expert. The court ruled that the facts in the case do not support application of the entire market value rule, and that OPTi’s expert would be allowed to present to the jury the balance of the opinions that were the subject of Apple’s motion (bad for OPTi but not horrible).

Trial is scheduled to begin in two weeks.

The case involves what OPTi describes as a patent for “Predictive Snooping of Cache Memory for Master-Initiated Accesses.” According to OPTi,

The complaint alleges that Apple infringes the patent by making, selling, and offering for sale various products based on and incorporating Predictive Snooping technology. OPTi has requested a jury trial in this matter. The Apple action itself is a part of the Company’s strategy for pursuing its patent infringement claims relating to its Predictive Snooping technology. Consequently, the outcome of the Apple case itself will play a role in the Company’s strategy for pursuing its patent nfringement claims and the Company’s ability to realize licensing revenue from its Predictive Snoop patents will be significantly affected if the litigation is not successful.

OPTi also has a patent suit against AMD. Game on!

DISCLOSURE: No position.

Comments

[sleepy:]

Another pathetic US patent on the obvious? File and sue the company with the most cash. Downside zero, upside huge payoff.

For those blinded by jargon, here's a real world analogy for “Predictive Snooping of Cache Memory for Master-Initiated Accesses”:

Preparing for your turn at the cash machine, having spontaneously decided to get some cash ("master initiated access"), by looking at ("snooping") the queue ("cache memory") to see how many are in front of you, and taking the card out of your bag just before ("predictive") you're at the machine, instead of just after, thus saving a few seconds.

Maybe there's something miraculously clever about the implementation, but probably not.

Apr 06 03:46 PM

[mplaut:]

OPTI owns the patents on specific chips that implemented the idea. A lot of companies used them, some with paying royalties and some without, so it must have been a good idea at the time.

From the company filing: "The two patents at issue in the lawsuit are U.S. Patent No. 5,944,807 and U.S. Patent No. 6,098,141, both entitled "Compact ISA-Bus Interface". The complaint alleges that Advanced Micro Devices, Atmel Corporation, Broadcom Corporation, Renesas Technology America, Inc., Silicon Storage Technology, Inc., SMSC, STMicroelectronics and VIA Technologies, Inc. have infringed the patents by making, selling, and offering one or more of the following products: core logic chipsets, Super I/O devices, Trusted Platform Modules, certain flash memory devices, certain I/O controllers and other semiconductor products incorporating Compact ISA-Bus Interface technology."

Apr 06 04:06 PM

[reagan:]

Yawn.

Apr 06 05:02 PM

[FreeRange:]

So let me get this straight, according to mplaut's post above, Apple is just using chips in their products that are made by companies, and it is those manufactures, not Apple, that are actually the ones infringing? And so they sue Apple instead of the manufacturers of the infringing components - obviously because of their deep pockets? If this is the case, OPTI is a scum sucking patent troll that should be put out of business.

Apr 06 05:30 PM

[Don Bowey:]

The few bare facts were interesting, but the personal commentary by the author requires that this be viewed as non-NEWS and put out with the cat litter.

Apr 06 07:21 PM

[Ronald J Riley:]

What we really have are a bunch of scum sucking patent pirating tech companies who are past their inventive prime who are well known serial infringers. When caught with their sticky fingers in someones patent cookie jars they whine about trolls.

A troll is really the owner of patent property rights and the scum sucking patent pirating whiners are really patent pirates who steal on the grandest of scales.

American ingenuity which is protected by patents is the only thing standing between our current standard of living and a precipitous drop. American inventors must be protected from invention promotion hucksters and big corporate patent pirating shysters alike because it is they who will create new jobs, industries, and prosperity for all.

Ronald J. Riley,

Speaking only on my own behalf.
President - PIAUSA.org - RJR at PIAUSA.org
Executive Director - InventorEd.org - RJR at InvEd.org
Senior Fellow - patentPolicy.org
President - Alliance for American Innovation
Caretaker of Intellectual Property Creators on behalf of deceased founder Paul Heckel
Washington, DC
Direct [phone] - [phone] - 9 am to 8 pm EST.

Apr 21 08:12 PM