September 12, 2005
Patent litigation in the RFID market
With every emerging technology for which the industry standards have not yet been universally accepted and the competition is high, the threat of patent litigations is very real. It appears that things are not very different in the field of RFID. The threat of patent litigation suits between Symbol Technologies Inc. and Intermec Technologies Corp. is very real. However, the two corporate giants have indicated that they would rather talk things over than litigate but as yet they have not been able to conclude their negotiations successfully.
The two companies have arrived at an agreement in the first week of September and have agreed to work on a cross-licensing agreement. According to this agreement, Symbol will become a part of the Rapid Start licensing program initiated by Intermec. This will allow Symbol access to Intermec's pool of patents that are in excess of 145. Symbol will pay Intermec an initial fee and royalties that will range from 2.5% to 7.5% of the price of the completed invention. By virtue of the cross-licensing agreement, Intermec will be able to access the intellectual property material held by Symbol, which includes around 50 patents. Intermec; however, has not joined the 20-company consortium of which Symbol is a part. The consortium plans to simplify access to RFID patents.
The patent disputes started when Intermec filed a suit for patent infringement against Matrics, which is a subsidiary of Symbol. Symbol filed countersuits against Intermec. Symbol faces problems on another front as customers are not too happy with the performance of its inlays used on a printer roll. Symbol has responded by introducing Glacier, which is a chip and antenna inlay that can be placed in a paper label. Inlay performance can be affected by the quality of the paper, rough handling, cracked die at the time of attaching the antenna, etc.
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