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New Patent Problems for RIM’s BlackBerry Device

6:30 am on May 2, 2006 | Category: Business, Law, Mobile Devices

A new intellectual property lawsuit has been filed against BlackBerry maker, Research in Motion, by Redwood California-based Visto.

This comes less than two months after RIM agreed to settle another patent infringement case with NTP, at a cost of $612.5 million, after a five-year legal battle.

The specter of new legal troubles caused the companyâ€™s stock to drop more than 6% yesterday, closing down $4.27 at $81.40, after hitting a low of $80.25 on the Toronto Stock Exchange.

RIM has responded by saying that the claims are totally invalid. “RIM believes it does not infringe Visto’s patents and will file its legal response in due course,” said a company statement released after markets closed. “In addition to challenging validity and infringement, RIM will now also consider asserting its own patents against Visto.”

Visto, on the other hand, seems confident about its chances of winning this battle in the long run. It successfully pursued a very similar lawsuit, leading to a federal court victory against Seven Networks.

“Under the law, which protects consumers from products that contain infringing technology, RIM should not be able to sell the BlackBerry system,” Visto claimed, citing the Seven Networks case.

Ontario-based Research in Motion is doing its best to avoid shareholder panic as a result of this issue, saying that it is “fully prepared and equipped” to deal with another lawsuit, and that it doesnâ€™t expect customers to be impacted.

In reality, Vistoâ€™s case is still at a very early stage, and likely wonâ€™t reach the courts until mid 2007, if at all. With RIM now on its guard, it is unlikely that Visto will be able to duplicate the set of conditions that NTP had to win the landmark settlement two months ago.

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