US Court Gives RIM Patent Victory Over MFormation

RIM has been handed a minor boost after the US District Court for the Northern District of California ruled it did not infringe patents owned by MFormation.

Judge James Ware said the company had failed to establish that RIM had infringed its patent and overturned the original decision that it had done so.

MFormation sued RIM in 2008, claiming the BlackBerry manufacturer had infringed its patent for a process that remotely manages a device over a wireless network.

RIM patents

In July, the court ordered RIM to pay an $8 royalty for every BlackBerry device connected to RIM’s enterprise server software, resulting in a total bill of $147.2 million (£94.3m).

RIM had argued that its opponent’s claims were invalid because the processes were already being used when MFormation made its patent application. Judge Ware agreed with the Canadian manufacturer, which welcomed the ruling.

MFormation has the right to appeal the decision, but even if it was successful, the original jury verdict would not be reinstated and a new trial would be conducted.

Last Month, RIM and Apple were cleared of infringing bankrupt Kodak’s imaging patents in a massive blow for the troubled photography giant, which was hoping to secure as much as $1 billion over the claim.

Not that things are much better for RIM. The first smartphones running BlackBerry OS 10 are not expected to hit shelves until January and BlackBerry devices accounted for just 4.8 percent of all mobile phone shipments in the second quarter of this year.

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