January 2013

January 9, 2013 - Steelhead Licensing LLC, a company that owns a patent related to 3G and 4G technology, filed a patent suit against 13 companies that either manufacture mobile phones or provide wireless service. Besides AT&T, Verizon Wireless and Research in Motion (RIM), the other defendants named in the lawsuit are MetroPCS, Motorola, HTC, Kyocera, LG Electronics, Sony, ZTE, NEC Casio Mobile, Sprint Nextel, Verizon Wireless, and T-Mobile USA.

January 9, 2013 - SmartMetric Inc., a company that developed biometric ATM and banking cards for use in protecting the carrier against identity theft, sued Visa and MasterCard for allegedly infringing its patent. A federal court has now scheduled a jury trial in the case for September of this year.

January 7, 2013 - Sling Media, a subsidiary of EchoStar, has filed suit against Monsoon Multimedia and Belkin International for infringement of five Sling Media patents.

Sling Media produces the Slingbox family of products, which allow users to broadcast content from their living room televisions to other locations via Internet-connected PCs, Macs, tablets and smartphones.

January 7, 2013 - A federal judge has dismissed a patent infringement suit concerning mobile, folding cafeteria tables.

SICO Inc., a manufacturer of portable folding furniture, was sued in April 2011 by its competitor AmTab Manufacturing Corp. for allegedly infringing U.S. Patent No. 7,758,113. The patent at suit relates to a seat post and support mount design used in folding cafeteria tables.

January 3, 2012 - On December 26, a jury found that Marvell, a California-based semiconductor company, had infringed two patents belonging to Carnegie Mellon University (CMU). The jury awarded $1.17 billion in damages to CMU.

January 2, 2013 - Apple added the Galaxy S III Mini to its patent litigation against Samsung in November, but withdrew the Mini from the lawsuit after Samsung stated that it is not "making, selling, offering to sell or importing the Galaxy S III Mini in the United States."

Samsung sells the Mini in Europe, where it competes with Apple's iPhone 5.