Andre Yoskowitz
2 Jan 2011 23:51
Sony has filed a patent infringement complaint against LG this week with the U.S. ITC (International Trade Commission), claiming many of the company's mobile phones and modems infringe on Sony's proprietary tech.
One of the patents relates to pictures associated with phone numbers. Most phones give the option for owners to add pictures of friends and family that will show up when that person calls.
According to Bloomberg, "Sony also said LG infringes on patented technology for encoding and transmitting audio in ways that adjust to available bandwidth capacity; delaying the start of audio recording for a set amount of time so that the recording doesn't pick up inadvertent noises; and technology for using the images streaming through a device's camera as a real-time viewfinder, then switching to saving better-quality files when the user decides to snap a picture."
Some of the other patents relate to how bandwidth is distributed and how network capacity is best used by modems.
Sony claims that Nokia, Samsung and Sony Ericsson license the patented technology, which LG did not pay for.
ITC cases sometimes take up to a decade to resolve, so it is not likely that LG products will be blocked in the U.S. anytime soon.