In November, a lawsuit was filed against Google (News - Alert) jointly by Boston-based Northeastern University and Massachusetts-based Jarg (a search technology company). These companies alleged that Google’s search service infringes on patented technology. Google has now responded to these allegations, denying all charges.

 

The suit, which was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, describes a distributed database system that breaks queries into fragments and distributes them to multiple computers in a network to get faster search results, PC World said in a Saturday report. The lawsuit demands that Google be prevented from further use of such technology to stop alleged patent infringement.

 

Google’s response was that the patent is invalid and should not have been awarded in the first place, PC World said. The company quoted various sections of U.S. patent law that deal with the novelty of an invention and prior art. The company also said the lawsuit is invalid because of laches, or failure to file complaints in a timely manner.

 

Google filed a counterclaim requesting the court to declare the patent invalid and unenforceable, PC World said.

 

The plaintiffs claim that the system which Google uses to run its search engine was originally invented by Kenneth Baclawski, an associate professor at Northeastern and one of Jarg’s founders, PC World reported. In fact, they say that Northeastern was awarded a patent for the system, which it then licensed exclusively to Jarg.

 

Both the parties have requested a jury trial. The case is expected to be completed during the next  18 months to two years, PC World noted. The U.S. patent, number 5,694,593, is dated Dec. 2, 1997.