Roku is infringing nine Universal Electronics patents in “four patent families and two general technology categories: remote control set-up and touchscreen remotes,” alleged Universal in a complaint (in Pacer) Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Santa Ana, California. Roku is "a relative newcomer to home entertainment control,” compared with Universal, which has a 30-year history and owns more than 350 home entertainment patents, said the complaint. Roku and Universal had a “mutually successful previous business relationship,” until Roku “decided to forgo” licensing key Universal IP that’s “prevalent in a number of Roku’s home entertainment products,” it said. Having tried but failed “to reach an acceptable business solution” with Roku, Universal “brings this suit to secure appropriate relief and ensure adequate compensation” for Roku’s unauthorized use of its technology, it said. Roku declined comment.
Though the vast majority of the nearly 3,000 comments in docket USTR-2018-0026 opposed a third tranche of tariffs on Chinese goods over intellectual property disputes, Veeco Instruments supports some proposed duties on “indicator panels incorporating LCDs or LEDs,” it commented, posted Sunday. Veeco also wants U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer to impose duties on more LED-related goods not currently proposed, said a document redacted to hide “business confidential” information. But it once identified the company, and a revised document posted Tuesday no longer did. The company had about $485 million in 2017 revenue, mainly through the sales of semiconductor process equipment used to produce LEDs and other components, it had reported. Luke Meisner, the Schagrin Associates lawyer who filed the comments, declined comment.
BERLIN -- Sony executives are big on 5G, they told a consumer electronics conference Thursday. They said it will benefit gaming and other user experiences. The company also unveiled a new smartphone.
Sonos has a global “portfolio of 630+ issued patents and 570 applications covering all manner of tech innovation,” spokeswoman Lizzie Manganiello emailed us Wednesday on our query about the company’s plans to commercialize the invention for which it landed a U.S. patent Tuesday on techniques of embedding ads as “structured metadata” in a “digital media playback system” (see 1808280002). “Some of these inventions have made their way into Sonos products, many have not yet, and some never will,” said Manganiello. “We’re not going to comment on our roadmap other than to say we won’t do anything that degrades the consumer listening experience.”
BERLIN -- IFA executives are hedging their bets on GfK forecasts that the global consumer electronics industry will grow marginally in sales this year because the U.S. trade wars with China and the EU make it impossible to foretell what the fallout might be on the tech industry, they told IFA’s annual opening news conference Wednesday. GfK estimates global CE shipments will rise 0.8 percent in 2018 to 854 billion euros ($999 billion), after a 1 percent increase in the year’s first half, said the executives.
Sonos landed a U.S. patent Tuesday for techniques of embedding ads as “structured metadata” in a “digital media playback system” for distribution to “multimedia players” installed in a home's “zones” and giving users the interactive capability to respond through a dedicated “input interface” on a controller. “Traditional” ad channels “can only provide static content and cannot engage potential customers interactively,” said the patent (10,061,742) based on a January 2010 application and naming Jonathan Lang and Ron Kuper as inventors. Lang is Sonos director-innovation and Kuper director of the company's Advanced Concepts Lab. The internet’s rapid growth offers advertisers “a unique opportunity to make interactive advertisement campaigns possible by allowing end users to close the loop, namely inducing users to click on an advertisement being served or linking the users to the actual product or service,” said the patent. Music publishers “supplement their revenue with advertising and connecting the audience with other products or services,” it said. Placing ads “between two musical pieces may not get a close attention from a listener as the listener may switch to another piece of music when a previous one is over,” it said. “There is a need for solutions that allow advertising to happen anytime an advertiser may deem appropriate.” Sonos didn’t comment.
Sixteen tool, SoC and content vendors -- no TV brands or film studios -- independent of the core founding companies of Fox, Panasonic and Samsung are first “adopters” of the HDR10+ Technologies licensing program, said the consortium Tuesday in a pre-IFA announcement. The update came a year to the day after Fox, Panasonic and Samsung first announced on the eve of 2017's IFA that they will form an “open,” licensable certification and logo program. HDR10+ Technologies “is actively partnering with companies throughout the media ecosystem,” and more than 80 “have already applied or completed the license program,” said the consortium. Fox is “encouraged by the interest of early adopters and an expanded HDR10+ ecosystem that will improve the viewing experiences for all,” said Danny Kaye, Fox Innovation Lab executive vice president-managing director. Fox is “committed to incorporating HDR10+ in its upcoming new release slate,” and is “currently exploring several titles for release in the marketplace,” said the studio.
Marketers of low-cost electronics for cars and other applications will be especially vulnerable if the Trump administration imposes a third tranche of 25 percent tariffs on Chinese imports, they commented Monday in docket USTR-2018-0026. Digital Products International (here) and car audio supplier Dual Electronics said their businesses are too profit-poor to absorb higher duties, worrying about increasing prices. Most Dual products sell for less than $100, for “people with older cars to not only have an affordable radio, but also basic connectivity features like Bluetooth,” wrote CEO Jim Braun. “Demand will surely drop for our industry” amid levies, he said. “Supply will be cut back as a result. Jobs will be lost as we, and others, adapt to a smaller business."
Roku TV functionality to send photos from smartphones to TVs violates three U.S. patents assigned to Ortiz & Associates Consulting, alleged a complaint (in Pacer) filed Friday in U.S. District Court in Wilmington, Delaware. The three patents, granted March 2015-January 2017, describe methods for wirelessly “rendering” content on a TV from a handheld smart device, said the complaint. Before the patents, inventor Luis Ortiz “recognized that wireless device users were generally restricted in all data use by small device-based viewers,” through their limited graphic-user-interface functionality or “inconveniently located rendering resources,” it said. Thursday, Roku didn’t comment. Ortiz filed similar complaints Feb. 1 against Google and HP in U.S. District Court in Chicago, records show. Google and Ortiz settled June 7, while HP successfully moved July 2 to transfer the case to U.S. District Court in San Francisco.
Consumers are “torn” on the role emerging technologies will play in their lives, with equal proportions expressing the thought that future technologies “will create as many new problems as they do solutions,” Intel reported Wednesday. It canvassed 1,000 consumers online May 9-20, with 102 identifying as “tech elites,” 25 and older with at least a college education, household income of $100,000 and higher and a tendency to follow tech news. Fifty-seven percent of consumers and 88 percent of elites agreed that they “generally feel excited about emerging technologies,” said Intel. Sixty-one percent of elites agreed that “I pride myself in having the latest technology,” compared with 21 percent of consumers. People generally “express the most excitement toward familiar, established technologies such as computers and smartphones,” the chipmaker found: In 50 years, they “expect these same technologies to be the most important, along with smart home technology.”