Macrosolve, headquartered in Tulsa, OK, has filed a patent infringement lawsuit against Facebook for violation of U.S. Patent No. 7,822,816.
The lawsuit claims “Facebook, directly or through intermediaries, made, has made, used, imported, provided, supplied, distributed, sold and/or offered for sale products and/or systems (including at least the Facebook mobile application product and/or service) that infringed one or more claims of the 816 patent, and/or Facebook induced infringement and/or contributed to the infringement of one or more of the claims of the 816 patent by its customers.”
The patent, issued in 2010, covers mobile information collection systems installed on smartphones, tablets and rugged mobile devices, regardless of carrier or manufacturer. Anyone who distributes electronic forms via the Internet or to mobile devices and then collects and evaluates the answers could be accused of infringing the patent.
MacroSolve initially sued four companies (Brazos Technology, On The Spot Systems, Formstack, Blue Shoe Mobile) that are not particularly large but not extremely small either. With the second lawsuit MacroSolve also targeted very little guys (Canvas Solutions, GeoAge, Kony Solutions, Widget Press, Pogo, SWD). Both lawsuits were filed with the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, a court that is widely considered “troll-friendly”. The latest suit is against Facebook.
They seem to be suing the smaller companies, maybe hoping to put them out of business since most won’t have the capacity to defend against that type of litigation. Several companies are trying to band together to get the patent voided. Until that time, MacroSolve seems to be spraying the field with bullets hoping some hit the target. Larger companies like Apple, Google and RIM seem content to sit on the sidelines and watch the melee.
Sources: Yahoo! Finance, MarketWatch, FOSS Patents