Amazon’s popular Kindle e-book reader is under fire. Discovery Communications is suing Amazon for patent infringement in the wake of a backlash from authors who insist Amazon is trying to skirt royalty payments.
Discovery filed its lawsuit Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Delaware. The company behind cable TV’s Discovery Channel is no patent troll looking to make a quick dollar on intellectual property.
Specifically, the suit says both versions of Amazon’s Kindle infringe on one or more of the patents that John Hendricks, founder of Discovery, was awarded in November 2007. Discovery’s Electronic Book Security and Copyright Protection System patent covers an encryption technology related to the distribution of digital books. Amazon wasn’t immediately available to comment.
Content-Delivery Innovations
Discovery says the company and its founder were significant players in the development of digital content and delivery services in the 1990s. Hendricks’ work, Discovery said, included the invention of a secure, encrypted system for the selection, transmission and sale of electronic books. The company is seeking damages and a royalty to compensate for “any future infringement” on the patent.
“The Kindle and Kindle 2 are important and popular content-delivery systems. We believe they infringe our intellectual-property rights, and that we are entitled to fair compensation,” said Joseph A. LaSala Jr., general counsel of Discovery Communications. “Legal action is not something Discovery takes lightly. Our tradition as an inventive company has produced considerable intellectual-property assets for our shareholders.”
Heavy Negotiations?
According to Raymond Van Dyke, an intellectual-property attorney in the Washington, D.C., office of Merchant & Gould, many companies promote innovations that cover their products as well as other technologies that may arise outside the core technologies. In Discovery’s case, he said, the company has a patent portfolio covering diverse technologies.
“Non-core patenting is often useful in cross-licensing situations with competitors, present and future. Discovery may also…