It took months and months of negotiations to get Swedish music streaming software into American, but it has only taken 2 weeks to get sued. Interestingly it's not for music piracy, but for streaming technology patents.
Software company PacketVideo has got its lawyers to fire off a letter to Spotify claiming the Swedish start-up has infringed one of their patents regarding a "device for the distribution of music information in digital form".
The lawsuit filed has been filed in both Holland and San Diego. PacketVideo is now owned by a Japanese Phone giant Docomo and they’ve claimed Spotify "knowlingly infringed and continues to infringed on a number of Packvideo Patents," including US Patent 5,636,276 and European patent EP 0 678 851.
PacketVideos general counsel, Joel Espelien, said: "our firm has a long history of software innovation, and is committed to creating inventive solutions that power unparalleled multimedia experiences on home and mobile devices worldwide.”
It is thought that PacketVideo has acquired the patents when it bought out a Swiss rival in the 90's. Quite why it has taken them several years to sue any of the other music streaming companies remains unclear. But we wouldn't be surprised if they are doing a little bit of grandstanding for effect.
In a statement, Spotify claimed PacketVideo “is claiming that by distributing music over the Internet, Spotify (and by inference any other similar digital music service) has infringed one of the patents that has previously been acquired by PacketVideo. Spotify is strongly contesting PacketVideo’s claim.”
Quite where this will end is unclear, but could be costly for Spotify as they would have to pay a license fee for every infringement. It’s way too early to know whether PacketVideo has a case, but it’s a not an ideal situation for the music streaming software and any of its competitors as well.