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Sunday Comics: Dead Island The Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has overturned the 2008 verdict of an East Texas jury that would have resulted in a ban on sales of the Nintendo Gamecube controller, Wavebird, and Classic Controller due to patent infringement.
Earlier today, we learned that Nintendo had lost its bid for a new trial in the patent infringement suit brought against it by small Texas-based firm Anascape Ltd. Nintendo is ordered to pay $US 21 million to Anascape, who also named Microsoft and Sony in the same lawsuit — those two, however, opted earlier to settle out of court.
A ban on sales of all GameCube controllers – including GameCubes that come bundled with the infringing controllers — issued by U.S. District Judge Ron Clark is currently on hold while Nintendo appeals the verdict on the Federal level.
If the appeal fails, what are Nintendo’s options, and what’s the gaming giant saying about the case?
You may recall that earlier in May, Nintendo was pinched to the tune of $AU 21.87 million in a patent infringement suit brought by Texas-based Anascape. Upon further review, the play stands — a U.S. District Court judge denied Ninty’s pretty-please to cut that $AU 21.87 mil to a less lottoriffic number. So unless they want to take this up the ladder to a U.S. federal appeals court, they’ll be cutting a check for that number.
Anascape sued back in 2006 and went for the kitchen sink, claiming Nintendo and Microsoft both infringed on controller designs they had patented. Microsoft settled with Anascape. The original suit against Nintendo covered everything from the Gamecube forward — the Wavebird and the Classic, plus the Wiimote and Nunchuk. The case decided in May found infringements only on the former two not the motion-sensing controls in the Wii. Still, $AU 21.87 million is not pocket change.
In 2006, a small Texan company by the name of Anascape Ltd. took Nintendo and Microsoft to court, claiming the pair had infringed on patents Anascape held relating to game controllers (presumably this one, filed in 2000, for a “3D controller with vibration”). While Microsoft decided to settle things out of court, Nintendo stuck to their guns, a move which has now cost them $US 21 million after a Federal jury ruled in Anascape’s favour. The ruling applies to Nintendo’s GameCube, Wavebird and Classic controllers (but not the Wii Remote or Nunchuk). Nintendo have said only that they plan to appeal, and that they expect the court to “significantly” reduce the amount of money they have to cough up.
[Associated Press]
