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Tesla is hit by $2B patent troll case from Nikola Motors

electrek.co

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Re: Tesla is hit by $2B patent troll case from Nikola Motors

#31

Post by mlevental »

maccard wrote: post #22
mrw34 wrote: post #14

Musk's comments from yesterday's earnings call: "We have a slight laughable lawsuit recently from some company ironically called Nikola. Nikola is suing Tesla. That's hilarious. Fate loves irony. But they're suing us because the way the trucks look, which is absurd. Nobody's buying a Semi truck because the way it looks, or because going to wraparound windshield or whatever. Please." https://seekingalpha.com/article/4…

> But they're suing us because the way the trucks look, which is absurd. Nobody's buying a Semi truck because the way it looks, or because going to wraparound windshield or whatever. Please." Whether that's true or not, it has absolutely no bearing on the validity of the lawsuit.

doesn't it? does this kind of thing depend on exactly whether whatever characteristic was copied/stolen is actually responsible for any of the revenue/purchasing?

Re: Tesla is hit by $2B patent troll case from Nikola Motors

#32

Post by kevin_thibedeau »

busterarm wrote: post #24
monochromatic wrote: post #3

How is this a patent troll? Nikola isn’t a non-practicing entity. They have their own competing product. Was the Apple-Samsung patent litigation “patent trolling?”

Part of patent trolling is the filing of obviously bogus patents like these to begin with.

These are design patents. They can't be bogus if they are sufficiently original. The Tesla design looks pretty damn similar to the Nikola.

Re: Tesla is hit by $2B patent troll case from Nikola Motors

#33

Post by toomuchtodo »

ams6110 wrote: post #28
jacquesm wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't matter if they are a practicing entity or not: they are still clearly using their patents in a trolling fashion. After all: (1) who had ever heard of 'Nikola' before this, (2) these patents are too dumb for words, (3) good luck showing $2B in damages and (if any) and (4) if you really believe that Nikola is now associated with Tesla because of battery fires then you're silly. These people are patent trolls…

> It doesn't matter if they are a practicing entity or not Yes it does, the key characteristic of patent "trolling" is that the patent owner is not practicing. I had heard of Nikola before this, because they have been featured on this site, and in other news outlets catering to EV-enthusiasts. Many patents seem to me to be dumb, or for completely non-novel, obvious things ("one click ordering", etc), but the patent o…

I assume they’re going to settle for $0, as Tesla will litigate until Nikola exhausts their runway.

Re: Tesla is hit by $2B patent troll case from Nikola Motors

#34

Post by LukeShu »

For those wanting to evaluate whether they think the Tesla Semi infringes on the patents, the 3 patents are:

U.S. Pat. D811,944 (issued March 6, 2018) on fuselage shape http://pimg-fpiw.uspto.gov/fdd/44/119/D08/0.pdf

U.S. Pat. D811,968 (issued March 6, 2018) on wrap windshield http://pimg-fpiw.uspto.gov/fdd/68/119/D08/0.pdf

U.S. Pat. D816,004 S (issued April 24, 2018) on side doors http://pimg-fpiw.uspto.gov/fdd/04/160/D08/0.pdf

Re: Tesla is hit by $2B patent troll case from Nikola Motors

#35

Post by Bartweiss »

_r_o_y_ wrote: post #5
monochromatic wrote: post #3

How is this a patent troll? Nikola isn’t a non-practicing entity. They have their own competing product. Was the Apple-Samsung patent litigation “patent trolling?”

I'm with you I don't understand why people are so quick to call a company a "patent troll" diluting the meaning.

I'm not sure what the origin of "patent troll" is, but common sources (e.g. Wikipedia) certainly don't say it's limited to non-practicing entities.

Patent trolling is an attempt to secure patents for the purposes of making money via lawsuits or licenses far in excess of the patent's actual value, using the threat of legal costs or hefty infringement penalties. This is particularly true when the patented trait is incidental, over-general, or simply granted in error.

So where does Nikola Motors fall?

- They use the patented techniques, and those features are not clearly incidental to the product.

But...

- Their suit claims 'damages' which are a large fraction of their company's lifetime revenue, and presumably an order of magnitude above their lifetime profits.

- A quick check of the side door patent shows that extremely similar products predate the D816,004 patent by quite a lot. The line between "already exists" and "is not a non-obvious advance on what exists" is sometimes fuzzy, but it's not clear why this patent was granted.

So yes - it's a suit conducted to make money in its own right rather than prevent use, claiming unrealistic damages for a dubious patent. By most usage, that makes it patent trolling even if you make products as well.

Re: Tesla is hit by $2B patent troll case from Nikola Motors

#37

Post by heavenlyblue »

mrleiter wrote: post #26

I have almost no knowledge of patent law, but calling this a troll case seems a bit naive. If it comes down to market confusion, than probably this won't stick, because as mrw34 said - nobody buys a truck for it's look, or at least no serious share of the electric semi truck market I think. But if the major deciding issue in a patent case is whether or not a feature of a patented product infringes on another feautre…

The Nicola Motors allows you to reserve up to 20 trucks in exchange for your e-mail address and $0.

I don't think they're really building anything.

Re: Tesla is hit by $2B patent troll case from Nikola Motors

#38

Post by diminoten »

ams6110 wrote: post #30
globuous wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's what I thought, but towards the end of the article, the author explains himself. With supporting research which I appreciated: > But now I cannot get behind them at all after such a clear case of patent trolling. > [...] > A wrap windshield on a truck? That has been around for years before Nikola Motors or Tesla Semi: > [picture of MAN truck with similar design] > Those types of concepts, like a mid-entry door…

So with all that prior art, why were the patents granted? Whose responsibility is it to demonstrate novelty? Does the patent office do research for prior art? Or are producers of similar products supposed to constantly review and monitor patent applications and challenge them?

Because examiners are not incentivized toward accuracy, but volume. An examiner is in no way held to account for an overly broad patent grant, or at least wasn't when my father explained/ranted about it to me a few years ago (he's an IP attorney).

Things could have changed since we last spoke about it, though.

Re: Tesla is hit by $2B patent troll case from Nikola Motors

#39

Post by DannyBee »

mlevental wrote: post #31
maccard wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But they're suing us because the way the trucks look, which is absurd. Nobody's buying a Semi truck because the way it looks, or because going to wraparound windshield or whatever. Please." Whether that's true or not, it has absolutely no bearing on the validity of the lawsuit.

doesn't it? does this kind of thing depend on exactly whether whatever characteristic was copied/stolen is actually responsible for any of the revenue/purchasing?

No. That is at best a question of damages, not infringement.

Re: Tesla is hit by $2B patent troll case from Nikola Motors

#40

Post by loceng »

kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #32
busterarm wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Part of patent trolling is the filing of obviously bogus patents like these to begin with.

These are design patents. They can't be bogus if they are sufficiently original. The Tesla design looks pretty damn similar to the Nikola.

Aerodynamics are aerodynamics, I'd argue it's an attempt to patent part of well-known physics.

Likewise, Tesla already has full windshield design in their other vehicles, and it's logical they'd extend that to other vehicles in their fleet of offerings.

On a side note, I don't know what patents Nikola has. They obviously don't have the brand recognition of Tesla and Elon Musk, and so they're clearly scared. I feel for them, however with the laws of economies of scale, in this day and age you aren't creating to support a whole ecosystem you won't be able to compete as efficiently.

Another side note, patents although seem to have some benefit, however it's arguable that they are holding back innovation and a higher quality of life for everyone - potentially suffocating innovation while extracting excess value from everyone, and funnelling money to those who already have the most money to invest to begin with.

It's obviously a difficult subject to navigate as we don't have an alternate system to compare to, well, except perhaps in part the ignoring of patents in China allowed their economy to boom.

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