Palm and 3Com are still appealing a ruling of December which found that the Graffiti handwriting recognition system used in Palm, Handspring and other Palm-licensed PDAs infringed a patent owned by Xerox for a system called “Unistrokes”. The lawsuit was first filed by Xerox in 1997.
Eric Benhamou, CEO of Palm, said yesterday of his company’s appeal:
“For thousands of years, people have been creating writing symbols. Xerox doesn't own the alphabet. Numerous handwriting-recognition technologies have long been available, some costing pennies per unit. Graffiti is only a tiny fraction of the software experience that drives the existing 21 million Palm Powered products.”
On Friday, Judge Michael Telesca of the US District Court in Rochester, New York, ruled that if sales of Palm devices continued, Xerox would not be irreparably harmed. However, he ordered Palm to pay the $50 million bond so that Xerox would be “able to collect at least some, if not all, of the damages it will suffer as a result of 3Com’s infringement during the appeal process.”
The $50 million bond does not cover damages for the infringing period that pre-dates the appeal. If the Court of Appeals rejects Palm and 3Com's appeal, the next step is for the trial court to determine the amount of damages for past infringement of the patent. If the infringement is determined to have been wilful, the court can triple the amount of damages due to Xerox. Both Palm and 3Com are jointly and separately liable.