Kodak Takes Shot at Apple, HTC in Patent Fight - Law Blog

By Chad Bray

Eastman Kodak Co. sued mobile phone and tablet makers Apple Inc. and HTC Corp. for patent infringement on Tuesday, just days after news surfaced that the venerable photography innovator was contemplating Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

The lawsuits, which were filed in federal court in Rochester, N.Y., relate to a series of patents for transmitting digital images from cameras and other devices.

The complaints (click here and here for copies) allege Apple and HTC, through devices such as the iPad and the Evo mobile phone, are violating patents on a series of digital images innovations developed by Kodak.

HTC said it couldn't comment until it had reviewed the complaint. Apple wasn't immediately available to comment.

The complaints come just days after reports surfaced that Kodak, a 131-year-old company, was making last-ditch efforts to sell some of its patents in hopes of avoiding filing for bankruptcy protection.

The patents at issue were developed by Kenneth Parulski, a Kodak Fellow who has more than 190 patents to his name and is known as a pioneer in digital camera technologies, according to the lawsuit. Not too shabby.

The patents "are from a collection of Kodak patents that arose, in part, out of Kodak engineers' identification of some of the shortcomings of then-existing devices and their vision of a direction for the industry with regard to image transmission," Kodak said in one lawsuit.

"For example, Kodak engineers recognized that it would be desirable for users to easily share images with friends or relatives directly from their digital cameras instead of first transferring the pictures to their personal computers."