Nintendo Successfully Pauses BlackBerry IP Suit Amid USPTO Review

By Editorial Team

A Seattle federal judge has ruled in favor of Nintendo in a legal dispute with an Irish company that owns the rights to several of BlackBerry's inventions. The judge has agreed to halt the infringement lawsuit while the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) reevaluates the validity of the patents in question.

The decision to pause the lawsuit comes as the USPTO conducts a review of the patents held by the Irish firm, which has alleged that Nintendo's products infringe on BlackBerry's intellectual property.

The patents under scrutiny include:

• 7,529,305 - Combination of space-time coding and spatial multiplexing, and the use of orthogonal transformation in space-time coding
• 9,313,065 - Scattered pilot pattern and channel estimation method for MIMO-OFDM systems
• 8,545,247 - Dock for a portable electronic device
• 8,115,731 - Method of operating a handheld device for directional input
• 9,542,571 - System and method of owner application control of electronic devices
• 8,610,397 - Battery charger for portable devices and related methods

Law firms involved in the case include Breskin Johnson, Cooley LLP, Lowe Graham, and Reichman Jorgensen. The companies at the center of the dispute are BlackBerry Ltd. and Nintendo Co. Ltd.

The U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington is overseeing the case, with Judge James L. Robart presiding over the matter.

For more information and updates on this developing legal issue, stay tuned to Law360.