The Lodys Group (www.lodsys.com) has posted a response to a response from Apple’s legal department regarding a patent lawsuit. Hang on; we’ll explain.
In 2011 Lodsys sued some iOS developers for using in-app purchasing systems that it claims violates patents it owns. The patent holding firm targeted small iOS developers with notices of patent infringement for providing in-app purchase and/or Apple App Store purchase links within their apps.
Apple’s legal department has came to the defense of iOS app developers with a letter to Lodsys regarding its patent dispute with app developers. In the letter to Lodsys, Bruce Sewell, Apple senior vice president and general counsel said:
“Apple is undisputedly licensed to these patents and the App Makers are protected by that license. Thus the technology that is targeted in your notice letters is technology that Apple is expressly licensed under the Lodsys patents to offer to Apple’s App Makers … These licensed products and services enable Apple’s App Makers to communicate with end users through the use of Apple’s own licensed hardware, software, APIs, memory, servers, and interfaces, including Apple’s App Store. Because Apple is licensed under Lodsys’ patents to offer such technology to its App Makers, the App Makers are entitled to use this technology free from any infringement claims by Lodsys.
Here’s Lodsys response to Sewell’s letter: “There have been requests from App Developers to provide more context to the situation with Apple … here [in a PDF at http://tinyurl.com/btxnnwp] is a redacted version of the response letter which Lodsys’ attorneys sent Apple in response (the parts redacted are due to Apple’s insistence that the actual terms of their license remain confidential). Lodsys does not dispute that Apple had a license, but Lodsys’ response does make it clear that, even if not void or otherwise terminated, the license Apple did have does not extend to independent App Developers.”
