“A lawyer/inventor by the name of Erik Cherdak of Maryland is suing Apple, Nike, PhatRat and a key individual by the name of Curtis Vock,” Jack Purcher reports for Patently Apple. “Mr. Vock is shown to be both a partner at the law firm of Lathrop & Gage and an inventor on the patent that was issued to PhatRat.”
“Erik Cherdak, who has sued companies like Wal-Mart Stores, Payless, Nordstrom, Kmart and others in the past, has an interesting complaint,” Purcher reports. “Basically Cherdak is claiming that Apple and Nike have either licensed certain patents or were assigned certain patents from PhatRat to legally protect the Nike + iPod product lines, but that PhatRat deceived the USPTO during a patent examination in gaining the patent grants.”
Purcher reports, “There’s a lot of money on the line here and this case may even slow down other sporting products that Apple may be working on at present.”
Read more in the full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Edward W.” for the heads up.]
wat a nazi scumbag pos
Career hint for the young ones. If you don’t have
the smarts or inclination to be a computers genius
and work for Apple, study to be a patents attorney.
You will have a lifetime job at Cupertino defending
its intellectual property against nuts like these.
Plaintiff or defendant, there is money to be made on either side.
Reading the linked article, I think the situation is that this guy is suing the company, Phat Rat, he formerly worked with over other patents Phat Rat was granted for related inventions, and that Phat Rat licensed those related patents to Apple/Nike. So he wants the related patents invalidated and then claim damages against his patents.
Whew.
Logic only a lawyer could love.