Apple Ordered to Pay University of Wisconsin $234 Million in A7/A8 Patent Lawsuit

[nutjob]

I don't get it this is not how patents are supposed to work. How does a university hold a patent. Surely a patent is to protect an idea when creating something. I think patents should only be granted once a working product is shown. If you invent something and don't sell it you are not helping competition. Sure licence the thing to apple if you wanna try it that way (apple will probably say no and suck up costs later) but i think if you patent something and don't make it you might as well be a patent troll, university or company it's an abuse of the intended purpose of a patent. It's supposed to prevent copying in the marketplace with competing products not to make lawyers rich.

LOL, universities are a major source of patents, since they tend to be full of clever people.

A patent doesn't protect an idea, it protects a method or process, an expression of an idea in the real world. You are not required to make anything or sell anything. Any legal entity can own a patent.

 

[HerrMann]

If I were Apple, I would settle outside of court and, rather than pay the $234 million, donate $250 million to the computer science/computer engineering/electrical engineering department and start recruiting heavily from their program. Turn it into a positive and leverage UW heavily.

 

[Keirasplace]

If I were Apple, I would settle outside of court and, rather than pay the $234 million, donate $250 million to the computer science/computer engineering/electrical engineering department and start recruiting heavily from their program. Turn it into a positive and leverage UW heavily.

There will be trials after trials after trials and they won't pay 200M. Samsung has been fighting Apple for 4-5 years and Apple and still haven't paid anything.

 

[bking10]

How does a publicly funded university hold a patent and it not be apart of the public domain?

 

[apolloa]

Just shut up and pay up Apple, that kinda money is done the back of Tim's sofa's!

But alas I suspect Apple would rather spend double the damage amount on lawyers endlessly appealing the case.

 

[HerrMann]

There will be trials after trials after trials and they won't pay 200M. Samsung has been fighting Apple for 4-5 years and Apple and still haven't paid anything.

Yeah, but that's between competitors. I feel like Apple could win huge in PR and future employee development if they leverage this right, but you're probably correct. They'll fight it tooth and nail.

 

[Exhale]

How does a publicly funded university hold a patent and it not be apart of the public domain?

Because the patent fees are used to fund further research by the holding university?

 

[69Mustang]

How does a publicly funded university hold a patent and it not be apart of the public domain?

Universities aren't 100% publicly funded. Tons of research is funded by private grants and other resources. Patent licensing fees is one of those sources. The more self sustaining the research dept is, the less public funding is required for that department. That money can be used elsewhere in the school. Public domain? How exactly would that work? School in Wisconsin patents a process, patent is public domain. Company in California uses that patent to help it make billions of dollars. How does that remunerate the Wisconsin public in this hypothetical?

 

[OC40]

School gets 80%. WARF gets 20%


They actively license a lot of their patents. Through 2013 they had 160 active patents, ranking them 6th behind Univ. of California, MIT, Tsinghua University (China), Stanford, and Univ. of Texas (hook 'em horns). University research is big business. Why shouldn't they benefit from the work?

This ^

I am shocked that Caltech is not on that list (California Institute of Texhnology aka Caltech).

 

[69Mustang]

delete. edited beyond comprehension.

 

[JodyK]

Really put's into perspective how much money Apple is making.

24,582,750,000 (that's BILLION) Through first half of 2015 ... With new products launched and scheduled for release and the holiday season ... The number is only going to get bigger!

 

[Khaaaaaaaaaan]

Because the patent fees are used to fund further research by the holding university?

Hardly. The schools are heavily funded by the government and corporate businesses to generate patents in order to use or license.

 

[ghost187]

I'm not here to defend Apple but, ultimately this money is from hundreds of thousands of people (maybe a million) who work hard to get an iPhone.

I remember Steve Jobs saying that if everyone who had a patent got what they want, it would be impossible to profit from the iPhone.

If you don't believe me just look at the quarterly earnings of Apple. If the iPhone costs about $200 to make and it's sold for $650+, well the profits should be significantly higher. Why is every Android OEM besides Samsung either in the red or they barely break even?

Back to the topic. I just believe the whole patent system is broken, especially in the tech industry. Imagine if everyone who sold pizza paid Italy, or everyone who sold Baklava paid Turkey, because you can argue that those nationalities should have "cultural patent" on those things.

Plus, what basis do they have to come up with the $234 million dollar figure? I'm sure you can buy the university for that much. And who gets this money? The students and the professors who worked on the patented technology? Yeah right! They won't see a penny. Will all of this money go to students in the form of scholarships? I don't think so. Greedy lawyers will get a huge cut, dean's close friends will get new contracting jobs, bonuses will be handed out to those who don't deserve it and so on...

Again, I'm not defending Apple, I'm just angry because at the end of the day, this is me and you getting raped. I'm sorry, there is just no other way to put it.

 

[macs4nw]

delete. edited beyond comprehension.

lol..... All those martinis?

 

[kdarling]

If it is true that Apple was not aware of the patent, this illustrates the big issue with the current laws. The law is meant to protect ideas from being stolen, but if the idea is independently arrived at, it shows that the idea was not novel to begin with.

In this case though, Apple was fully aware of the patent, because they referenced it in (ummm... let's see... searching the USPTO database... ) wow at least 34 of their own patents.

The earliest cite I've seen so far is from 2007, so Apple knew about it long before the A7 was first used in 2013.

Bet the school itself sees NOTHING of this money.

That's a really bad bet. WARF was set up in 1925 specifically as a non-profit R&D organization that plows its patent revenues back into more research and into general grants to the university.

How does a publicly funded university hold a patent and it not be apart of the public domain?

WARF is separate from the university and funded by its own patents and projects.

whats the point of having a patient but not actively using it or licensing it?

WARF had been licensing this patent for years. Heck, their charter is to do research and license it.

According to their lawsuit, they approached Apple about licensing, Apple responded that they don't accept outside license offers and refused to negotiate, so WARF felt they had no other choice but to sue.

 

[69Mustang]

lol..... All those martinis?

Yup! In-laws in town.

 

[Gasu E.]

What does that have to do with anything? Or because one person stole something, it's ok if you do too?

If they really did willingly and knowingly do this, then I'm glad they got caught and called on it.

Patent infringement is not "stealing" unless it's willful.

 

[Gasu E.]

If it is true that Apple was not aware of the patent, this illustrates the big issue with the current laws. The law is meant to protect ideas from being stolen, but if the idea is independently arrived at, it shows that the idea was not novel to begin with.

The law is not "meant to protect ideas from being stolen"; the law is intended to encourage innovation. "Intellectual property" is a concept that only exists under the law, just like a "corporation."

 

[Rocketman]

Is it tax deductible?

Steve was a proponent of fairness. This was fair.

Apple, don't appeal this ruling of all rulings. Settle the next case on this basis and move on. I believe in pursuing all rights to the bitter end and this case is not one of those.

Feel free to call me and ask why.

 

[greenmeanie]

Sad thing is you live in CA lol.

Ya, but you still have to live in Wisconsin so...

 

[NuclearWasted]

Putting that into perspective, that's about 10% of their endowment.

 

[zooby]

.

 

[StevieD100]

whats the point of having a patient but not actively using it or licensing it?

I had a patent (granted in 1981). It was done for the kudos from my peers inside the company. To my knowledge no one ever used my 'thing' but that was not the point. I got a financial reward from the company (and a promotion) for getting a patent and that's it. I used to use the patent as a fact on my resume. Then too many companies wanted me sign away my rights to the patent as a condition for getting a job offer (ofen ignoring the fact that the patent had lapsed due to time) .

Nowadays everything is about the $$$$$$ and to hell with anything else.
This made me remove it and got a lot less grief.

 

[Piggie]

I do have to giggle a bit when you hear things like this, when you recall how STRONGLY some people here swear blind that Apple design and develop their chips totally in-house from scratch by apple's own design engineers.

 

[HerrMann]

And who gets this money? The students and the professors who worked on the patented technology? Yeah right! They won't see a penny.

This is not true. At most Universities, students can and often are listed on the patent filings and are often a part of any deals in which the patents are used. For example, the University of Wisconsin distributes as follows:

First $100,000 of Income per license (Laboratory Share distributions)

20% to Inventor(s)
70% to Research Program of Inventor(s) through a quarterly Laboratory Share Distribution
10% included in the WARF gift to campus​

Income over $100,000 per license (Department Share distributions)*

20% to Inventor(s)
15% to Department/ Center through an annual Department Share Distribution
65% included in the WARF gift to campus​

According to the patent in question, there are four listed inventors. I am not sure how much the patent attorney and legal fees are associated with this process, but let's just assume they take half of the settlement. That is $117 million to the attorneys and $117 million to the school. Of the $117 million to the school, each inventor will receive their share of 20% of the payout. That is $23.4 million between the four of them.

My suspicion is that the lead inventor will take the most, followed by the supporting inventors. Let's spitball and say the lead inventor gets half of the payout while the other three get 16.6% each. This means they each receive the following:

Andreas I. Moshovos (assumed lead, listed first): $11.7 million
Scott E. Breach: $3.9 million
Terani N. Vijaykumar: $3.9 million
Gurindar S. Sohi: $3.9 million
​

This is also not to mention the funds that will go to the department to pay for graduate student stipends, laboratory and research upgrades, tenured faculty, recruiting, etc. This is a big boon for UW, it's professors, students, and staff.

Also, this does not take into account ongoing royalties. If Apple wants to license the patent, they'll have to pay for it.