A legal dispute between Realtek and MediaTek has kicked off over Realtek claiming that MediaTek has gotten a third party company to sue Realtek over some unspecified patents involving technology used in smart TVs and set-top boxes. The third party involved goes under the name of IPValue Management Inc and appears to be what is generally known as a patent troll, i.e. a company that buys up patents and uses them to take legal actions against other companies, without actually producing anything related to the patents in question. Realtek claims that MediaTek is conspiring with IPValue to drive Realtek out of the market, leaving Mediatek in a close to monopoly situation in the market.

According to Reuters, Realtek told the publication that it filed the lawsuit against MediaTek to "protect free and fair competition in the industry" and "prevent further harm to the public." Neither MediaTek or IPValue have commented on the lawsuit to the publication. What makes this entire mess even more peculiar, is that MediaTek is said to have a licensing agreement in place with a subsidiary of IPValue called Future Link System LLC, which was signed in 2019. This agreement was brought up by the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC) in a separate lawsuit last year, with the ITC calling it alarming and the court calling it improper. After the ITC criticism last year, Future Link apparently settled with several other companies such as Amlogic, but not with Realtek, which is why the company is now taking things to court. Realtek claims that MediaTek is trying to force any allegedly infringing chips out of the market and trying to make Realtek look like an unreliable partner and supplier to its customers. As such, Realtek wants the court to end the alleged conspiracy and is also asking for damages. Time will tell if Realtek is successful or not, but it seems strange that a patent troll would agree to licence its patents to some parties, but not all, since the only reason for a patent troll to exist is to make money from its patents.

Intel filed an anti-trust lawsuit against Fortress Investment Group, a firm owned by Japan's SoftBank, over alleged malpractices with their patents. Intel alleges that the company stockpiled patents to make a living out of IP disputes with other companies, including Intel. The complaint filed with the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California in San Jose alleges that Fortress bought up over 1,000 U.S. technology patents, some of which include patents from NXP Semiconductors. It's now using these patents to get Intel to pay up a royalty on every processor sold since 2011. SoftBank bought Fortress in 2017 for USD $3.3 billion as part of a massive takeover of the tech world. One of SoftBank's other priced possessions include ARM.

The lawsuit alleges a motive behind Fortress's behavior. "One way in which Fortress has tried to turn around its performance and justify SoftBank's investment in it is through increased speculation on patent assertions," the lawsuit says. Intel accused Fortress of patent-trolling, alleging that the company's move to soak up tech patents constitutes anti-competitive behavior as it's driven by the idea that the patents would cost less than what other tech companies would pay up to avert an IP lawsuit.

Thanks to a ruling from the Supreme Court, patent trolls could see their designs being thwarted more often than they have until today. Patent trolls stand as a scourge of the industry, ie, companies and even individuals that hold intellectual property with the sole purpose of levying infringement lawsuits against other companies - without producing anything themselves. They're kind of the leeches of the tech and business worlds, without some of the benefits their biological counterparts manage to deliver.

This is an unusual article to cover at Techpowerup: We don't usually do mobile stuff. Nevertheless, when a household name like AMD strikes out against some household names in the mobile verse such as LG, Mediatek, Vizio, Sigma, and such, we probably should cover it. AMD's financial wellbeing is important to competitiveness and all, right?

Cooler Master introduced a new line of all-in-one liquid coolers, under the MasterLiquid Pro series. Available in two variants, the MasterLiquid Pro 120 (120 mm x 120 mm radiator) and the MasterLiquid Pro 240 (240 mm x 120 mm radiator), these coolers feature a unique (patent troll-proof?) design for the pump block, which sees the pump separated yet attached to the block in a way that maximized coolant pressure onto the block. This lets them lower the pump speed and hence lower the noise output. Cooler Master refers to this as the FlowOp Technology. These coolers will include MasterAir Pressure series fans.

For the third consecutive time this year, Nintendo has prevailed in a patent litigation in the U.S. A Maryland U.S. District Court judge has summarily dismissed a patent infringement lawsuit against Nintendo brought by IA Labs CA, LLC. IA Labs had alleged that the Wii Balance Board accessory and Wii Fit and Wii Fit Plus software infringed on one of its patents (U.S. Patent No. 7,121,982).

"Nintendo has a passionate tradition of developing innovative products while respecting the intellectual property rights of others. We vigorously defend patent lawsuits when we firmly believe that we have not infringed another party's patent. We refuse to succumb to patent trolls," said Rick Flamm, Nintendo of America's senior vice president of Legal & General Counsel.