TiVo patent claims survive re-exam intact; EchoStar doomed?

Bloomberg reported on 29 Nov 07:

TiVo Inc. had its biggest gain in 2 1/2 years in Nasdaq Stock Market trading after reporting a narrower loss and saying the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office upheld its patent for digital-video recorders.

TiVo said today the agency found its patent valid, a decision that may bolster its position in a lawsuit against satellite-television provider EchoStar Communications Corp. EchoStar is trying to overturn an $89.6 million patent- infringement verdict won by TiVo.

The decision ``clearly represents a reinforcement that the appeals process with EchoStar should result in a favorable outcome for TiVo,'' Fred Moran, an analyst at Stanford Group in Boca Raton, Florida, said in an interview. He recommends investors hold TiVo shares and doesn't own any.

See Sept 06 IPBiz post: Re-examination . Hmmm, how long did the re-exam take?

Bloomberg also wrote:

JPMorgan Chase & Co. analyst Barton Crockett raised his recommendation on the stock to "overweight," which means he expects the stock to outperform the average total return of the shares he covers. He previously rated TiVo "underweight."

TiVo has a 70 percent chance of winning its patent- infringement litigation against EchoStar, the New York-based analyst wrote in a note to clients today.

EchoStar is appealing TiVo's win in court, saying the trial judge erred in defining what TiVo invented concerning DVRs. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit [CAFC] in Washington is considering the validity of the patent and whether Englewood, Colorado-based EchoStar uses the technology.

(...)
Analyst Gould said the odds of TiVo winning the case are better than the one in five chance that was reflected in the stock. He said his best guess is a 50-50 chance.


money.cnn wrote:

TiVo Inc. Thursday [Nov. 29] said it is pleased the Patent and Trademark Office [USPTO] has found all the claims of its 'time warp patent' to be valid after conducting a re-examination at the request of EchoStar Communications Corp.

(...)

'Today's decision by the PTO brings us another step closer to ending EchoStar's continued infringement and we are hopeful that the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit will uphold the district court judgment of patent infringement and reinstate the injunction,' TiVo said.


See also:

http://ipbiz.blogspot.com/2006/05/digital-tv-recording-to-change-tv.html

http://ipbiz.blogspot.com/2006/04/tivo-wins-patent-case-against-echostar.html

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In terms of dull stupidity, Mass High Tech: The Journal of New England Technology wrote:

The U.S. Patent Office has issued patent No. 10/669,101, for spectral imaging of deep tissue, to Cambridge Research and Instrumentation Inc. The patent covers the use of multispectral imaging combined with spectral unmixing, which is intended to increase clarity of images taken from living creatures.

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Of relevance to the Boston area, James Niccolai, IDG News Service reports:

Google has been given an extension until January to reply to a patent infringement lawsuit brought by Northeastern University and a company in Massachusetts that develops distributed search technologies.The professor at Northeastern is Kenneth Baclawski and the company is Jarg.

As IPBiz asked before, are Northeastern, Baclawski, and Jarg to be considered patent trolls?