A Protus news release claiming victory in a patent suit brought b...

Court for the Central District of California dismissed the case “with prejudice,” blocking Catch Curve from reasserting patents against Protus. In Protus’ statement Wednesday, the Canadian Internet fax company said the court threw out the case after holding in a May Markman hearing that the Catch Curve patents didn’t apply to Protus’ MyFax and Virtual Fax services. But that’s not how it happened, Adelman said. “Protus did not ‘win’ anything and the court did not rule on anything that resulted in the ultimate dismissal,” he said. Protus’ account of the Markman hearing is “incorrect,” the general counsel said. “Instead, after years of litigation, Protus finally disclosed that certain of its operations were based outside of the United States. Based on that… disclosure and given the nature of the particular patent claims at issue in the U.S. Catch Curve case in light of limitations of U.S. patent law, the case was voluntarily dismissed.” That result “does not change anything either with regard to J2’s or Catch Curve’s position with respect to Protus or with respect to the ongoing Catch Curve licensing program,” Adelman said. Asked for comment, Protus stood by its news release. “We maintain that the Markman hearing results were completely in our favor and these patents do not apply to the MyFax services. The fact that the case was dismissed was a clear win for Protus,” a spokeswoman said. Protus wouldn’t say why it issued the release a month after the court order. “There was no time disclosure requirement attached to the release,” the spokeswoman said. J2 and Catch Curve have several other lawsuits against Protus in the U.S. and Canada. In Canada, Catch Curve has a patent suit covering “the sales that were also the subject of the U.S. case,” Adelman said. And J2 has suits “on a number of different patents against Protus in both Canadian and U.S. courts,” as well as a “significant junk fax case against Protus in the U.S.,” he said.