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New Smartphones Patent Sets Off Series of Lawsuits
Patent-holding firm charges over 30 smartphone makers with violation
Patent-holding firm Minerva was awarded a very broad patent earlier this week which TechDirt notes is essentially a general patent for the smartphone device. Immediately after the patent was issued, Minerva filed lawsuits against almost every smartphone maker that you can think of including Apple, AT&T, RIM and Sprint. In fact, they apparently filed those lawsuits before they received the patent then realized that this might look bad, pulled the lawsuits, waited for the patent approval and re-filed the suits. In total, over thirty defendants are named across three different lawsuits.