Granting of Apple Patent makes GoPro share price drop

There has been some dispute on how the news that a company is sued for patent infringement influences the share price (in particular in the context where the plaintiff is a so-called troll, see here).

Today's news is that not a legal action but merely the publication of a decision to grant a US patent relating to an action camera system to Apple Inc. made the share price of the "action camera" producer (and market leader) Go Pro dramatically drop. Indeed, the share value of GoPro dropped by roughly 13% on Tuesday.

Looking at the 1 month chart (right), the development appears less dramatic and well within the order of magnitude of typical fluctuations.

A further interesting point is that the patent specification specifically mentions drawbacks of GoPro products (this not being a surprise given that GoPro is the market leader). This is interpreted by the jounalists in such a way that Apple has specifically targeted GoPro. An interesting case on how and why the mentioning of drawbacks or problems of competitor's products in a patent specification may harm a company's reputation and be unfair competition (and what the company can do against this) was reported here.

The secretive business attitude of Apple promotes speculations on potential new business fields in an extreme way and the mere publication of patent application has already been the basis for business news created by journalists reading the tea leaves and subsequent hysterical reactions earlier. However, the huge impact on a specific stock price of a third party is a new and scary development for me. After all, patent documents are not meant to be business news.

Patent wars: New ammunition

During the last months we have seen several movements that suggest several companies are very active obtaining new ammunition.

As we have previously reported (here), at the end of June Nortel announced that the wining bidder of its patent portfolio was a consortium consisting in Apple, EMC, Ericsson, Microsoft, Research In Motion and Sony. That Consortium bided US$4.5 billion, while Google bided US$ 900 million.

Google didn’t wait much to react and on July 28 Bill Slawsky informed that “on July 11th and 12th, Google recorded the assignment of 1,030 granted patents from IBM covering a range of topics, from the fabrication and architecture of memory and microprocessing chips, to other areas of computer architecture including servers and routers as well” (here). Only one day latter, Bill Slawsky published the list of 1,029 patents involved (here).

A couple weeks latter, on August 15, Google announced the acquisition of Motorola Mobility for $40.00 per share in cash, or total of about $12.5 billion (here). This was announced a few weeks after the largest individual Shareholder of Motorola Mobility, Billionair Carl C. Icahn (11%) suggested Motorola to monetize its patent portfolio (here). As Spencer Ante (WSJ) explained, Mr Icahn considered that the value of Motorola’s patents would be around US$ 4.5 billion (video here). Casually or not, the same figure that the mentioned Consortium paid for Notel’s patents.

What was Google buying in August? Of course Google was obtaining ammunition to attack (Motorola's patents), but not only. We should also bear in mind that on October 6, 2010 Motorola Inc. “announced that its subsidiary, Motorola Mobility, Inc., has filed a complaint with the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC) alleging that Apple’s iPhone, iPad, iTouch and certain Mac computers infringe Motorola patents. Motorola Mobility also filed patent infringement complaints against Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) in the Northern District of Illinois and the Southern District of Florida” (here).

With this ammunition gathering, we could expect Google to sue Apple. Before jumping to the battle field, it has helped one of its close friends, providing HTC with new ammunition to use in the battle it is facing with Apple (here).


Should Apple fear? Maybe not much, since yesterday it obtained a nuclear weapon: The USPTO granted patent no. 8,046,721 for “a method of unlocking a hand-held electronic device”. As James Kendrick reports, "every Android device now infringes Apple patent".

When will they face the final battle in this war? (if ever)

By the way, I first posted in PatLit on October 25, 2010 (one year already!). I want to celebrate with all of you. Feel free to take a slice from this pie and drink some Cava with me. Cheers!

Oracle v Google (2)

Here's some interesting fresh news in this case. I read Wednesday in Groklaw:

“In the reexamination of U.S. Patent 6192476 the USPTO has issued an office action in which it rejects 17 of the patent's 21 claims. The specifics of the office action are set forth below in text form along with an updated reexamination history. While Oracle has asserted seven different patents in its claims against Google, if this reexamination is exemplary of what Oracle can expect in each of the other reexaminations, Oracle will have a hard time finding claims that it can successfully assert against Google, and there lies Oracles conundrum. Oracle either has to agree with the court's directive to limit the number of claims it will assert at trial, or it is likely the court will simply stay the trial until the reexaminations are complete.”

Early this month I made reference to the amount of damages that Oracle would be claiming in the action against Google (here). It seems to me that this reexamintaion could have an impact in the amount the Court will consider to grant (if any). What should Oracle do now?. Should Oracle modify their damages claim in order to show the impact and provide new figures?

Other questions may arise. 17 from 21 means 80% of the registered claims!. How many “void patent claims” are registered at the USPTO? How many court claims are in course based in “void patent claims”? How many injunctions have been granted based in “void patent claims”? How much money have plaintiffs obtained from “void patent claims” infringement? How much are defendants spending in “void court actions”?


I don’t know why but Nortel’s 6,000 patent portfolio immediately came to my mind. Google bided $ 900 million for that Portfolio. What if 80% of claims in these patents are also void?

Other questions regarding that bid may arise, reading:
Comments fro the AmeriKat on Google’s bid (here)
Reference in Reuters to Microsoft objection to Google’s bid
Yesterday's news regarding the US antitrust regulators giving Apple the green light to make a bid on Nortel’s portfolio (cnet)

Mobile Wars: end of one battle

Busy days in the Mobile Wars. Nokia has announced today that it has entered into patent license agreement with Apple.

As we read in nokia's webpage, “the agreement will result in settlement of all patent litigation between the companies, including the withdrawal by Nokia and Apple of their respective complaints to the US International Trade Commission”.

No reference is made to the amount, but it may be significant since “this agreement is expected to have a positive financial impact on Nokia's recently revised outlook for the second quarter 2011 of around break-even non-IFRS operating margin for Devices & Services”.

Stephen Elop, president and chief executive officer of Nokia shows their happiness "to have Apple join the growing number of Nokia licensees”. Mr. Elop considers that "this settlement demonstrates Nokia's industry leading patent portfolio and enables us to focus on further licensing opportunities in the mobile communications market." Who will be the first target in these further licensing opportunities? A new battle may be shortly served.