Acacia Technologies
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Acacia Technologies was also the name of division within Computer Associates that effectively closed down in 2002 when its assets were sold to SSA Global Technologies. Its products were primarily targeted at the AS/400 and included the Quick Response Engine.
Acacia Technologies is used loosely to refer to Acacia Research Corporation and its subsidiary Acacia Media Technologies. The company specializes in acquiring and enforcing patents. The company controls over 30 patent portfolios in a wide variety of media, internet and technological industries.
[edit] Controversy
Acacia has been accused of being a patent troll and frequently uses 'bully' tactics in conducting its business. After it secures its broad-based patents, it then forces small companies to pay royalties on its licenses by threatening legal action knowing full well these companies cannot afford to defend themselves.
Acacia is named by the EFF as one of the worst offenders for crimes against the public domain including;
- Employing laughably broad patents that would cover everything from online distribution of home movies to scanned documents and MP3s
- Threatening dozens of small companies, including many home-grown adult websites
- Infringement campaign threatens to chill freedom of expression by limiting small companies' and individuals' ability to stream their content online.
They are currently claiming to have a patent for any system that compresses and distributes video and multimedia, especially over the web. This is a very broad claim. They are currently suing the pornography industry, presumably because they would be a soft target.
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
- Fight the patent Overview of media patent.
- Acacia Technologies
- Article from IEEE on the business model of Acacia.
