A relatively unknown firm has now sued Apple, Samsung, and SanDisk over a patent related to an “MPEG portable sound reproducing system.”
The suit, which surfaced last week in Marshall, Texas, was filed by a company called Texas MP3 Technologies. The location of the lawsuit is no accident, as the district is known for awarding generous and often speedy decisions to patent owners. The specific infringement involves patent 7,065,417, which was first filed and later sold by multimedia chipmaker SigmaTel. The patent was allegedly offloaded to the Texas company to better maximize its value. “Because these are such basic patents to digital music, we believe it will be difficult to design around these patents and have a commercially viable player,” SigmaTel said in a statement following the patent sale. More details are likely to surface in the coming weeks.