Verizon (News - Alert) Communications now has sued its second cable company for infringing VoIP patents it owns. Verizon already had filed suit against Cox (News - Alert) Communications and now has filed suit against Charter Communications.


One whimsically wonders which cable operator will be sued in March, or as soon as Verizon gets a ruling on the new patents it believes the cable industry is violating. There seems no reason it principle Verizon will not sue every significant cable operator in the U.S. market, as all of them use the same fundamental technology approach, known as "PacketCable". To be sure, the lawsuits are an unwelcome nuisance and could well result in new footnote items for the reporting cable companies (either notification that there is pending litigation or that an award amount has been set aside as a payout relating to a settlement or judgment).

In its earlier successful lawsuit against Vonage (News - Alert), the court upheld Verizon's claims that Vonage infringed three patents. Verizon claims Cox and now Charter Communications infringe eight separate patents, including the three Vonage is said to have infringed, but also including new claims relating to the means used to ensure quality of service.

As it turns out, the Vonage precedent is potential bad news for most VoIP providers. If it turns out the cable operators and Vonage are guilty of different patent violations, other patent holders who also sued Vonage successfully may well follow suit, as it were.

Separately, Net2Phone is suing Skype for patent infringement as well.

------------

Gary Kim (News - Alert) is a contributing editor for TMCnet. To read more of his articles, please visit his columnist page.

---

---

Subscribe FREE to all of TMC's monthly magazines. Click here now.

---