While seven-digit numbers are usually reserved for a company’s bottom line or telephone number, the seven digits in 6,219,694are of extra importance to Canadian-based wireless messaging company Research In Motion Ltd. Those seven numbers represents the patent issued to the company last week from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office covering the technology used in its BlackBerry Single Mailbox Integration service.
“Issuance of this patent for BlackBerry Single Mailbox Integration is an important milestone and represents the first in a series of patents covering various aspects of technologies utilized in the end-to-end BlackBerry solution,” said Mike Lazaridis, president and co-chief executive officer of RIM.
With its newly issued patent in hand, RIM warned it was ready to defend its technology-in court against Glenayre Electronics Inc. and in the marketplace against an upstart unknown firm called Danger Research.
RIM said the patent relates to the system and method pioneered and employed by the company in redirecting information between a host computer system, such as an office personal computer or server, and a mobile communications device, while maintaining a common electronic address between the host system and mobile device.
In operation, the technology allows BlackBerry users to have e-mail sent to their personal computer forwarded to their mobile device, and in turn allows the user to reply and generate e-mails from the mobile device using their PC e-mail address. The RIM two-way pagers transmit via packet data technology such as Mobitex.
“This patent is important to RIM stakeholders because it recognizes and protects the fundamental intellectual property that RIM has invested substantial resources to invent and develop over many years,” explained Jim Balsillie, chairman and co-CEO of RIM.
“This patent represents a powerful defensive strategy for RIM,” said IDC in a report. “By securing rights to its solution, competitors will be forced to either partner with RIM or develop their own solutions.”
Balsillie said the company would continue to look for partnerships to licenses the Single Mailbox technology to help develop the market.
“We are definitely looking for reputable partners,” Balsillie said.
Potential partners include Palm Inc. and Microsoft Corp., which have expressed interest in developing paging-type devices that might compete against RIM’s current offerings.
With its new patent in hand, RIM also announced it had filed a lawsuit against Glenayre for infringing on its trademark and patent. The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware, claims Charlotte, N.C.-based Glenayre violates federal patent law 35 U.S.C. 271, by infringing on its recently issued patent. The lawsuit also alleges Glenayre violates the Lanham Act and the Delaware Deceptive Trade Practices Act for deceptive trade practices and unfair competition based upon Glenayre’s unauthorized use of designations and names similar to registered trademarks belonging to RIM.
“They have been a blatant imitator and aggressor towards us,” Balsillie contends.
Glenayre filed a similar lawsuit against RIM in 1999, contending RIM violated its patent regarding power generation from a dual battery source. Glenayre pagers, which are used with ReFLEX-based networks, feature two batteries-a non-replaceable Nickel Cadmium battery and a replaceable AA battery, from which the NiCad battery recharges. Glenayre claims RIM’s Inter@ctive pagers use the same process.
At the time of that lawsuit, RIM said its pagers utilized the disputed battery technology since inception, and RIM became aware of the patent only after a deal to license the technology from Glenayre for $4 million fell through.
Glenayre said it could not comment on the pending lawsuit from RIM since it had yet to receive any official notification of the charges.
“Given the suit against Glenayre, it’s clear that RIM is determined to aggressively defend its intellectual property and any competitor developing a proprietary solution will have to tread lightly or risk the company’s ire,” IDC said.
In addition to its lawsuit against Glenayre, RIM also may have to look over its shoulder at another competitor that surfaced last week from Silicon Valley start-up Danger Research. While little is known about the company or its product, it was reported last week that the technology being developed uses Sun Microsystem’s Java software technology and was dubbed a “Blackberry killer.”
“After years of waiting for Java on phones, we finally have a product and it makes a lot of sense,” Alan Reiter, president of consulting firm Internet Wireless and Mobile Computing, told the New York Times. “It will transform the way you look at your phone.”
According to Danger, the technology was developed with only $11 million in start-up financing and hopes to take advantage of upcoming 2.5 generation networks. The New York Times said Danger was in talks with numerous wireless carriers in the United States and Japan for a commercial rollout later this year.
Even with the potential competition from Danger, RIM is confident of its dominant foothold in the market, and even included a quote from Danger CEO Andy Rubin praising RIM’s technology in its patent press release.
“Sure, its flattering to be imitated,” Balsillie said. “But, we offer a real solution that is available now.”
RIM’s stock was relatively unchanged the day the patent was granted at around $34 per share, but was up almost $10 for the week. Glenayre’s stock tumbled early last Thursday before rebounding to close near $2.35 per share.
