Patent troll extraordinaire NTP Inc. has already sued just about everyone in the mobile industry (famously Research In Motion but also Apple, Google, HTC, LG, Microsoft, Motorola, AT&T, Sprint Nextel, T-Mobile, and Verizon Wireless) and now appears to have found a new target, one that is already in a corner where punches are being dealt: Yahoo.
NTP alleges that Yahoo infringes patents it owns, more specifically covering wireless email technology and radio frequency antenna design.
About half of the US patents held by NTP were originally assigned to a company called Telefind, which was partly owned by the late inventor Thomas J. Campana. The company is now out of business, and NTP apparently decided that suing the world for infringement of patents it acquired was a much better business model than actually building something useful.
That said, Yahoo better be prepared to defend itself vigorously – five of the patents in-suit were subject of earlier, intensive patent litigation between NTP and RIM. The Blackberry maker settled the lawsuit in March 2006 for a whopping $612.5 million.
The complaint is embedded below.
Yahoo was founded in 1994 by Stanford Ph.D. students David Filo and Jerry Yang. It has since evolved into a major internet brand with search, content verticals, and other web services. Yahoo! Inc. (Yahoo!), incorporated in 1995, is a global Internet brand. To users, the Company provides owned and operated online properties and services (Yahoo! Properties, Offerings, or Owned and Operated sites). Yahoo! also extends its marketing platform and access to Internet users beyond Yahoo! Properties through its distribution network...
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