Nintendo sent out word to us yesterday that it has won the patent case against its Wii console. UltimatePointer, LLC asserted in this case that the Wii console infringed upon its patents (numbers 8,049,729 and 7,746,321). However, on March 1st, a Federal Circuit Court of Appeals found that the Wii console does not in fact infringe upon those two patents. This confirms Nintendo’s previous win in this case in the Seattle Federal Court. Nintendo of America’s Director of Litigation and Compliance, Ajay Singh, had this to say:
“We are very happy with this result. This case again demonstrates that Nintendo will vigorously defend itself and its innovations against patent lawsuits. It also demonstrates that, when justified, Nintendo will pursue all available options to recover attorney fees for improper litigation conduct. Nintendo continues to support reform efforts to reduce the unnecessary and inefficient burden patent cases like this one place on technology companies in the United States.”
The Appeals Court also agreed with the Seattle Court’s ruling that UltimatePointer, LLC is required to pay some of Nintendo’s attorney fees, as they were found to have engaged in “bad faith, vexatious, [and] wanton” conduct when they decided to accuse products which they hadn’t even investigated, or in some cases that didn’t even exist!
