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January 12, 2008
Pay Wave
PrivaSys
is printing money with
7,195,154, claiming secure contactless credit card transaction processes.
Going a few rounds with MasterCard ended in settlement in August 2006. In March
2007, First Data opened its wallet. Now, Visa, JPMorgan Chase and Wells Fargo
splash out.
In September 2005, PrivaSys sued MasterCard for allegedly stealing and patenting its secure credit card transaction technology. PrivaSys had spilled the beans to MasterCard under non-disclosure agreement. MasterCard spun out patents. Messy claim and counterclaim of trade secret misappropriation, breach of contract, unfair competition, fraud, and bad juju led to a cross-license.
First Data was a tame licensing deal by contrast.
A couple of months after '154 issued, in June 2007, PrivaSys stuck it to Visa, later adding JPMorgan and Wells Fargo. Visa counterclaimed for the usual reasons (invalidity, non-infringement), with an inequitable conduct kicker for not doing a kiss-and-tell to the PTO over the MasterCard affair; a lot of loose talk that led to a tidy wad for PrivaSys.
Posted by Patent Hawk at January 12, 2008 1:19 AM | Patents In Business