Optima vs. Roxio patent infringement claim court date set

January 28, 2004

Last year in December the Roxio company, known of
course for their Easy CD/DVD Creator and Napster software, was sued by Optima Technology. According
to Optima, Roxio had infringed a patent owned by the company regarding
the "Recordable CDROM Accessing System".

Simply said, back in 1995 Optima developed a
technology which made it possible to read a recordable optical
disk in every computer. Previously this was not possible because of
the limitations of the ISO 9660 standards. Since then other companies, including
Roxio, have used this, or similar, technology without Optima's
permission.

Now, thanks to GristyMcFisty we can read an update on the Optima
vs. Roxio lawsuit over at The Register. Optima's patent infringement allegations
against Roxio will be heard by the US District Court of Central California on 19
April 2004:

And not just Roxio. "Optima believes most every company in the CD
burner industry may be infringing," the company's attorney, Robert Lyon, a
partner at Holland & Knight, said when the legal action was announced,
last December.

Optima claims that the patent is infringed by now
standard ways of burning CDs as laid down by the CD-R and CD-RW technology
guarding, the Optical Storage Technology Association (OSTA). Roxio is an
OSTA member, as is Sony, HP, Imation, Microsoft, Pioneer, Ricoh, Toshiba
and Verbatim. Associate members include Apple, Eastman Kodak, Epson,
Fujitsu, Iomega, JVC, Plasmon and many more of the CD-R industry's leading
lights.

Optima CEO Robert Adams told The Register: "Get ready for more" -
a hint that further legal action may be in the offing. For its part, Roxio
disputes the allegation, claiming that none of its products utilise
techniques described by Optima's patents.