NEWS

BlackBerry Accuses Facebook of Infringing Its Patent Rights

Release time:

2018-03-09 02:06

According to Reuters news on March 7, Canadian communications company BlackBerry filed a lawsuit against Facebook, accusing the latter's WhatsApp and Instagram applications of infringing its own patents.

BlackBerry spokesperson Sarah McKinney (Sarah McKinney) said that the Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp applications use some of the communication functions originally designed by BlackBerry. The infringed patents cover a wide range of reporting information encryption, battery and chat information display, and the combination of mobile chat tools and games.

BlackBerry said in its complaint that Facebook used BlackBerry's patented technology to create mobile communications applications that used many of the security, user interface and feature enhancements that have made BlackBerry a major commercial success. Therefore, BlackBerry believes that Facebook's use of these technologies without BlackBerry's authorization is an infringement of its own patent rights. Therefore, BlackBerry asked the court to order Facebook to stop providing its main applications and Facebook Messenger, Workplace Chat, WhatsApp Messenger and Instagram applications and websites.

Paul Grewal (Paul Grewal), deputy chief legal counsel of the Facebook, obviously disagrees with BlackBerry, saying in a statement that Facebook the company intends to fight this lawsuit with BlackBerry, it is clear that the Facebook still has some confidence in its victory. In this statement, Paul Grival also said that "BlackBerry's lawsuit actually reflects the current situation of BlackBerry's SMS business. BlackBerry has abandoned its innovation efforts and is now seeking to" tax "the innovation of other companies '."

BlackBerry CEO John Chen believes that lawsuits against patent infringement can be seen as one of the strategies to make money for the company. In the past, BlackBerry once dominated the smartphone market, but since then BlackBerry has shifted its focus to network security software and invested in the operating system of self-driving cars.

At present, BlackBerry is working to persuade other companies to pay its patent royalties so as to be authorized to use its more than 40000 global patents in the fields of operating systems, network infrastructure, audio, communications, automotive subsystems, network security and wireless communications.

A recent example is last year, Qualcomm agreed to pay $0.94 billion (about 5.9 billion yuan) to BlackBerry to resolve the arbitration issue of patent royalties. In October 2017, BlackBerry announced a non-disclosure agreement with Blu Products, a Florida-based manufacturer of low-cost mobile devices.

It is undeniable that as far as the patent itself is concerned, it can not only be used as a weapon to protect its own rights and interests from infringement, but also as a commodity in exchange for commercial benefits. Who makes the patent the weapon itself?

News source:http://tech.sina.com.cn/roll/2018-03-07/doc-ifxsrwhe7269120.shtml

This news was re-edited and reorganized by the Huaxun team and added analytical comments.