Patent troll out from under the bridge. This time it isn’t a replay of the NTP vs Research in Motion nonsense but rather, a new one. This time a company called GraphOn has filed suit against Google, Yahoo and others over an apparent violation of four of their patents. They managed to obtain these patents through an acquisition of a company called Network Software Engineering Inc in ’05.
Never heard of GraphOn? Yeah, me neither.
From MarketWatch:
The complaint, filed in United States District Court in the Eastern District of Texas, alleges infringement of U.S. Patent Nos. 6,324,538 (the ‘538 patent), 6,850,940 (the ‘940 patent), 7,028,034 (the ‘034 patent) and 7,269,591 (the ‘591 patent) which protect GraphOn’s unique method of maintaining an automated and network-accessible database. The suit alleges that Google’s Base, AdWords, Blogger, Sites and YouTube online services infringe the GraphOn patents. The suit seeks permanent injunctive relief along with unspecified damages.
So, is there merit? Or is this a chance for a lottery win?
Yeah, I know.