Apple may face more lawsuits over its use of multi-touch technologies in the iPhone which resembles Stantum's Lemur music control surface patent
Stantum caused a little bit of a stir today at the Interactive Display Conference 2009 in San Jose, Calif.
The French startup claims to be the pioneer of multi-touch technology – the same used by Apple on the iPhone and iPod touch – with its Lemur music control surface, the first commercial product using multi-touch and released in 2004.
“It’s a fantasy to say that Apple can own the technology of this whole industry with their multi-touch patent. And as always, the more noise Apple make about suing everybody over multi-touch, the less the value of there intellectual property (IP),” said Stantum co-founder Guillaume Largillier.
Apple is bluffing with its multi-touch patent, and is now a target for patent infringement lawsuits
Stantum has developed multi-touch technologies for the last 7-years and file patents a few months before Apple’s.
To prove his point, Largillier recalls Elan Microelectronics patent lawsuit earlier this month against Apple claiming the iPhone and the iPod Touch is infringing its patents; and seeking triple damages and a “reasonable royalty.”
“The capacitive displays – used in Apple’s iPhone touchscreen – are a mined area in terms of IP. It’s just the beginning,” warns Largillier.
Speaking later in the day, Synaptics‘ product marketing manager Andrew Hsu was also skeptical on the importance of Apple’s multi-touch 250+ pages patent filing and its 15 claims, saying that it only really about an algorithm for scrolling and panning.
“The technology is not new. Most of the core ideas were there since the late 70s,” said Hsu.
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