Philips VS Nintendo round two. And it's not good...

[Kyanbu The Legend]

http://www.screwattack.com/news/phil...ainst-nintendo

As reported by Bloomberg, economic giant of The Netherlands and tech industry leader (and maker of the flop CD-i console) Philips, has won one of its four patent lawsuits against Nintendo.

The U.K. High Court has ruled that "The Big N's" Wii U console (and to a lesser extent, the original Wii) infringes on two Philips patents regarding motion sensing technology. Because of this, Nintendo is due to pay Philips an undisclosed (although likely exceedingly large) cash settlement.

Luckily for "The Big N," judge Colin Birss ruled Nintendo did not infringe upon a third Philips patent pertaining to the modeling of a body in a virtual environment. So that will soften the financial blow a little bit.

In an official statement sent out to members of the press, Nintendo made it quite clear that it plans to file an appeal to this ruling, so the U.K. chapter of the Nintendo/Philips legal battle isn't quite over yet.

“Nintendo has a long history of developing innovative products while respecting the intellectual property rights of others. Nintendo is committed to ensuring that this judgment does not affect continued sales of its highly acclaimed line of video game hardware, software and accessories and will actively pursue all such legitimate steps as are necessary to avoid any interruptions to its business.”
This whole mess began in 2011 when Philips alerted Nintendo that its hardware infringed on three Philips patents. After failing to settle things outside of the courtroom, Philips launched four separate lawsuits against Nintendo. One in the U.K., in Germany, one in France, and as we've previously reported, one in the United States.

After this current ruling, I'm sure even more eyes will be on the U.S. patent case, since if Nintendo loses that one, Philips will be given the legal authority to block all Wii U sales in the country...and since America is the biggest console market in the world, that would be a devastating blow to "The Big N."

So if the U.K. court appeal fails, I think there will be a good chance that Nintendo will be willing to offer some sort of royalties settlement out of court.

We'll have more on this story as it develops.

Geeze Nintendo just cannot catch a break. And if this goes south, it'll be very bad news for Nintendo fans in the states.

[Aerozord]

If this is financially significant, it might have just killed Nintendo.

I dont mean in the immediate, but it might mean they wont have the capital to afford another new console. So unless WiiU sales jump I dont see them coming back

[Kyanbu The Legend]

If this goes through, I have a feeling Sony might be next.

[greed]

It's uh not that bad. It's bad. But not like death of Nintendo as a console manufacturer bad. Seriously stop overreacting like with Capcom.

[Kyanbu The Legend]

Obviously not, but the WiiU being banned from the states will hurt games sales and releases here for the still struggling console.

There is away around this though should Philips win this case. Which is renaming the WiiU model 2 and selling it without the gamepad. Granted Nintendo may just win this one since it's extremely clear that Philips is patient trolling. Their patient on screen sharing between two devices is so vague it hits way too many companies to fly. Especially for tech they aren't using out side of that one computer they built a long time ago.

[Aerozord]

I doubt they could win in a US court. Patents are really easy to get around in the US as they only cover very exact designs. You can't patent an idea, only the hardware and there is often more than one way to get the job done.

Though there have been some odd rulings on technology before so I wont rule it out.

[Daimo Mac, The Blue Light of Hope]

Given the source of this, I am seriously doubting anything can happen. This is like back when someone (on this forum i believe) linked an article regarding how Sony's Dual Shock 2 was infringing on a patent and all games that used were not allowed to be sold.

[Kyanbu The Legend]

Originally Posted by Mac

Given the source of this, I am seriously doubting anything can happen. This is like back when someone (on this forum i believe) linked an article regarding how Sony's Dual Shock 2 was infringing on a patent and all games that used were not allowed to be sold.

That's understandable. And if it can, Nintendo will try to seek a compromise.

[greed]

Originally Posted by Aerozord

I doubt they could win in a US court. Patents are really easy to get around in the US as they only cover very exact designs. You can't patent an idea, only the hardware and there is often more than one way to get the job done.

Though there have been some odd rulings on technology before so I wont rule it out.

I think Phillips already lost in an American court. Like Nintendo will probably have to pay some fairly minor (for a major corporation) compensation to Phillips but I can't see this going further than that.

[shiney]

Philips also is going to have to show they are utilizing the patent in the US as recently circuit courts have sided against patent infringement claims, stating the act of holding a patent simply to hold the patent does not fulfill the patent's purpose and inhibits rather than encourages competition. If Philips is holding their patent and sitting on it and doing nothing, then Nintendo has even less to fear.