Dolby Laboratories announced that Research in Motion
(RIM) agreed to enter into a license agreement for its use of Dolby’s
advanced audio technologies that were the subject of two lawsuits recently
filed by Dolby against RIM. As a result, those cases were dismissed based on
agreement between the parties.
We are pleased to welcome RIM into Dolby’s family of
mobile technology licensees. We believe in and will continue to
protect the value of our intellectual property,” said Andy Sherman,
executive vice president and general counsel of Dolby.
RIM obtained its license through Via Licensing
Corporation, a Dolby subsidiary that licenses patents essential to the High
Efficiency Advanced Audio Coding ( HE AAC”) international standard on behalf of
multiple essential patent owners.
Dolby’s patented audio compression technologies
contribute to that standard. HE AAC provides highly efficient digital audio
compression, which allows manufacturers and consumers to provide and enjoy high
quality audio while using extremely limited amounts of transmission and/or
storage space for such audio.
HE AAC is widely used in consumer electronics
devices such as smart phones, portable music players, computer tablets and
personal computers. HE AAC makes possible playback of digital music and other
digitized audio that has been compressed to less than 10% of its original
digital file size. RIM employs HE AAC technologies in its Blackberry smart
phones and Playbook tablet devices.
On June 15, 2011, Dolby filed lawsuits against RIM that
focused on RIM’s use of Dolby’s industry-leading audio technologies. The suits
were filed in the U.S. District Court in San Francisco, CA, and in the Mannheim
District Court in Mannheim, Germany.
As Dolby disclosed during its third quarter earnings call
on August 4, 2011, RIM signed a license agreement shortly after the lawsuits
were filed. The license agreement is on the standard terms offered by Via
Licensing and covers the implementation of the HE AAC standard, including use
of Dolby’s audio compression technologies in RIM’s smart phone and tablet
devices.
By Telecomlead.com Team
editor@telecomlead.com
