Acacia Research didn't wait long to act after completing its deal to buy the Global Patent Holdings patent portfolio: The company said this week that Thomson SA has signed a license agreement for the portfolio that covers interactive television data transmission with digital signals, from sports scores and weather information to stock updates and movie listings.
Thomson signed the agreement with Acacia subsidiary KY Data Systems. The patents in question amounted to part of 27 patent portfolios Acacia bought from Global in a deal finalized at the end of January. The patent folio Thomson licensed covers such receivers as set-top boxes and some television sets used in digital satellite and cable systems.
Those receivers, Acacia said announcing the Thomson licensing deal, "permit television viewers to access interactive television features supplied by their satellite and cable providers as part of their digital programming packages.
"Data, which is associated with the interactive television features and is broadcast along with the video signal, is extracted and processed by components within the receivers, and is then made available to viewers who choose to access the interactive television features through their remote control," the company added.
Acacia has been battling several Adult Internet companies since late 2002 over the company's streaming media patent group claim, known as Digital Media Transmission. A case management conference with U.S. District Judge James Ware is scheduled for February 28, after a so-called multi-district panel convenes to determine whether DMT litigation in four other jurisdictions around the country should be moved to California's central district, southern division.
