Two Christmas gifts for the Aussies: First, Australia beat England in the Ashes (pulverized, really: Simon Barnes, the London Times cricket analyst, wrote: "I accept defeat at the hands of a superior force. What I don't accept is surrender.... England didn't lose the Ashes; they surrendered them.") Second, research organization CSIRO took an important step forward in its legal battle for royalties payment on its OFDM patents. The U.S. Federal court in California has agreed with CSIRO that the cases be moved to Texas, where a federal judge is already familiar with the case and the related issues, and has already issued a ruling favoring CSIRO in its skirmish with Buffalo Technology.
CSIRO argues that Buffalo's 802.11a and 802.11g wireless devices infringe on its U.S. patent which covers OFDM, now widely used in WiFi systems. Last year, Intel, Dell, Microsoft, HP, and Netgear sued CSIRO in Federal District Court in San Francisco seeking a declaratory judgment that its the organization's 1996 patent which covers 802.11a and g technology was invalid. The move of the case from California to Texas is interpreted as an implicit recognition of the merit of CSIRO case.
If CSIRO wins, many companies will have to pay tens of millions of dollars in royalties.
For more more about the CSIRO case:
- see this Seattle Times report
- and Naomi Graychace's Wi-fiplanet report