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- Date:
- Wednesday, June 02, 2010
- Author:
- Kyle Bennett
- Google +1
Storm LLP Answers Heat Pipe Lawsuit for FrozenCPU
Attorneys at Storm LLP, representing FrozenCPU, have found some interesting documents that would seemingly show the basis of "CPU Heatsink Lawsuit" to be full of hot air.
Introduction
If you remember, back in April we reported that a number of U.S. based companies were being sued for selling heat pipe CPU coolers. Yes, those "normal" TRUE type of coolers that many of us use in our own systems. A company in California is claiming that a group of retailers are infringing on its patent by selling those coolers to you. Interestingly enough, this company decided to forgo the "big guys" in the lawsuit and focus rather on smaller U.S. based companies. To us here at HardOCP this looks to be nothing more than a shake down. Spending many hours with the plaintiff's patent only seemed to strengthen my thoughts on this. One small company decided that it would not cower to this frivolous lawsuit, but rather, fight back. FrozenCPU, long time friend and supporter of HardOCP, hired Storm LLP in Dallas, TX to defend it. Going back and reading our previous article will give you all the background you should need to understand the situation, so I am not going to repeat the entire article here.
Today
John Fischer of Storm LLP, lead counsel on the case got in touch with us yesterday and explained that it has uncovered prior patent documentation that it thought would stop the lawsuit pretty much in its tracks. Storm LLP stated that this patent, "eliminates any possibility that this case involves normal, air-cooled cpu heatsinks that have heatpipes and fin assemblies."
If you go through the above "Chao Patent" you will see a patent previous to the one that is currently being cited in the "American Technology, Inc v. Altima Computer, Inc." which also includes FrozenCPU. This patent shown here today was granted 7 years prior and also very much more specific to the type of air coolers that we use for CPU cooling. Storm LLP went on to tell us that, "We’ve sent this to opposing counsel in this case, and asked him to explain what exactly is his basis for suing Frozen CPU as well as the other defendant companies since the "Chao" patent describes the aforementioned air cooled heatsinks with heatpipes AND predates American Technology Inc’s patent."
Also, interestingly enough, it looks like the "modern" heatpipe CPU cooler was born right here in Plano, TX which happens to be HardOCP's home base.
The Bottom Line
We are sad to see such lawsuits pop up and impact the companies that are the lifeblood of the computer hardware enthusiast industry. Hopefully this prior art will put the brakes on what seems to be an obvious "scam" in our eyes that will only serve to artificially inflate the prices of our CPU coolers. We can only hope that FrozenCPU recoups the money lost to attorney's fees while defending itself from this idiocy.