Mario Doesn’t Walk Free

Nintendo’s desperate appeal hasn’t been heard. In a continuation of the patent infringement suit involving Anascape against Nintendo and Microsoft, a U.S District Court Judge recently upheld the previous decision made in May. That decision states that Nintendo is in the wrong…in fact, 21 million dollars in the wrong!
In case you aren’t in the know, the Texas-based Anascape originally sued both Nintendo and Microsoft (talk about David versus Goliaths) for allegedly infringing on 12 controller designs that they had patented between 1999 and 2004.

These stolen controller technologies included analog sensors, tactile feedback, and vibration mechanisms — some pretty important stuff. You can check these patents out for yourself at the US Patent Office; here’s one example. Nintendo brought into play all of its resources to fight this charge. Microsoft, realizing that they were in the wrong — and reaffirming just how smart Harvard drop-out Bill Gates is — decided to cut its losses and didn’t even go to court. How far did Gates have to reach into his pocket to settle out of court with Anascape? Well, part of the arrangement was that the details of the amount paid would remain undisclosed, so we can’t be sure. What I can tell you is that in the court case against Nintendo, “David” prevailed again.

The suit was decided in favor of Anascape, forcing Nintendo to pay some serious reparation fees. Nintendo’s pride was obviously hurt, since, even with the original decision going against them, they refused to take their just desserts. Instead, they tried to call on the courts mercy, asking for a “fair” penalty. Fair? I’d say 21 million dollars is more than fair considering that not only can Nintendo afford to pay, but the technology they stole is what makes the Wii (their money-making goldmine) possible. Nintendo probably had visions of a reversal similar to Microsoft’s, in which Alcatel-Lucent was forced to watch their 1.52 billion dollar pay day for Microsoft’s infringement on their MP3 digital-music patents get taken away from them. But for Nintendo, this bail-out was not to be. The federal courts obviously agreed with my feelings on the subject, as Nintendo’s pretty-please plea wasn’t heard. Anascape won the case…but I hope Nintendo realizes that 21 million dollars was a steal considering that they have made WELL over that in Wii system sales. In reality, they got off cheap.