Ah, patent trolling: the last refuge of a dying company. Don’t get me wrong. I love my TiVo. It’s like a friend and a lover. We still have the old DVD-burning Humax model – I didn’t even upgrade to the wonky cable-card HD model – and the fact that I, a fairly plugged in tech nerd didn’t bother to upgrade is a testament to the company’s slow descent. I know there are better things out there and better things coming down the pike and so the current my TiVo is just fine by me.
That leads us to TiVo’s lawsuit against AT&T and Verizon for time-shifting patents. Here is the basic info:
ALVISO, Calif., Aug. 26 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ — TiVo Inc. (Nasdaq: TIVO) today filed complaints in the United States District Court, Eastern District of Texas against AT&T Inc. and Verizon Communications, Inc. for infringement of the following three TiVo patents U.S. Patent Nos. 6,233,389 B1 (”Multimedia Time Warping System”), 7,529,465 B2 (”System for Time Shifting Multimedia Content Streams”), and 7,493,015 B1 (”Automatic Playback Overshoot Correction System”). The complaints seek damages for past infringement and a permanent injunction, similar to that issued by the United States District Court, Eastern District of Texas against DISH/EchoStar.
The DISH lawsuit lasted for five years and involved, in short, the company presumably infringing on TiVo’s “concept” of stream time-shifting. Essentially they’re saying that only they can build a time shifting DVR.
Essentially TiVo is going after DVRs, straight up. TiVo’s patent is for a device that can allow you to watch one program while recording another. In a world where standalone TiVo boxes are going the way of the Dodo, this patent could be a goldmine for the failing company, resulting in a series of nutritious lawsuits until the company ends up like SCO – a lawsuit slinging shell of its former self.
Call it patent trolling, but I think TiVo has a valid claim here. They invented the concept and devices that went with it, and they have a legitimate interest in protecting those technologies. Patents don’t just protect an idea as long as the company that owns the patent can make money at it – they protect it for a set period of time. Patents are an important part of protecting innovation, and as long as they aren’t so protective as to completely restrict future development of ideas (i.e. 100 years of patent protection) I think they serve a valuable purpose. I’m with TiVo on this one. If they have to make a buck licensing the patent rather than producing the hardware, that’s fine with me.
if they go after every DVR maker in the world they’re going to get their ass handed to them.they’re going for the big guys right now but soon it will be some random chinese company and they’ll be bogged down in litigation.
Absolutely. They’ll probably get just as bogged down by going after these big guys too, who have a lot of money to spend trying to wrench patents from TiVo.
Legitimate patent protection? Probably. Good business decision? Questionable.
I had to give up my Tivo when I moved to HD on DTV and the DTV HD-DVR stinks! No dual live buffers, slow interface and takes years to boot up. If Tivo is on their way down, it is not for lack of quality. Quite a shame.
Now that TiVo has successfully sued Dish Network, they are going after Telco TV, Is big cable next? Comcast has ready signed a licensing agreement, with TiVo, Cable operators who don’t sign a licensing agreement will get sued. That’s how a maker of a great technology becomes a patent troll.
My understanding is that DirecTv is playing ball too and that new DirecTivo units (as the DTV reps love to call them) will be available soon.
I love my Tivo. I hope they kick ass.
Dude, you consider yourself a “a fairly plugged in tech nerd”?? Seriously? Have you heard of googling something before writing an article on a particular topic?? I bought TIVO a little over a year ago around $5.00 a share. They’re now at around $10. And you call them a “dying company”?? Tivo has achieved something that not many companies have accomplished: making their brand name a verb. That my friend, is an accomplishment in itself. And I would love to see your reaction if you ever came up with something clever only to see it stolen by every other telco company. You obviously don’t understand the “concept” of patenting and trademarking.
You also miss the point that a court has ruled that Echostar/Dish Network WAS INDEED at fault. They are appealing but the ruling will more than likely not be overturned.
If I were you I would delete this post and act like I’d never said anything showing how ignorant I was over intellectual property.
-Thomas
I would sell if i were you:
The company reported it swung to a $2.94 million second-quarter loss as the company lost 146,000 net subscribers, but this still exceeded analyst estimates. Sales dropped 12 percent to $57.4 million in the second quarter, but this again, beat Wall Street forecasts and is a slight sequential increase from the prior quarter.
John,
You may be right, it would be a good time to sell.
My point was that this company has a 129% return on a 5 year graph, 27% for trailing 52 weeks, and 41% for Year to date. They also have comcast partnership coming soon in the US and several other telcos worlwide.
I would definitely not call this company “failing”.
If I’m not mistaken (didn’t bother to look at financial statements) they have been cutting losses for the past couple of quarters.
Also, new sales are not really a good indicator of how the company is doing. Their main operating revenue comes from subscriptions and advertising which are both service-based. I know a TIVO new generation isn’t cheap, but I don’t think that that’s where their main income is coming from…
My 2 cents.
-Thomas
PS: I had absolutely no trading experience before investing in TIVO…
They’re not a “patent troll” if they win the case mate!
The term “patent troll” is a label used by multi-billion dollar companies who use arrogant business practices to force small companies with legitimate patent claims to go through up to 5 years in court at a cost of multi-million dollars in legal expenses to win the patent license/fees that they were legally due in the first place!
Eg: How many patent cases is Microsoft currently losing?