Mike Pellegrino, president of Indianapolis-based Pellegrino and Associates, has been in touch with a tip-off about a patent purchase that does not seem to have been reported up to now:
Intel announced its intent to strengthen its position in the wireless technology market in a large way last year with the acquisition of a large block of patents from InterDigital for $375 million. And the company started 2013 off with a bang, continuing its patent acquisitions of wireless technologies from InterDigital and its subsidiary IPR Licensing Inc on 2nd January. The bulk of the patents reside in US classifications 370 (multiplex communications), 375 (pulse or digital communications) and 455 (telecommunications). Key technologies of interest in the acquisition include what might be called the “usual suspects” for efficient and cutting-edge wireless communications technologies: spread spectrum, channel assignments, hand-off control, multiplexing and near-field communications. Given that these are the hottest areas of development over the last three years, such acquisition trends are not likely to abate anytime soon.
Mike tells me that the purchases on 2nd January were made up of 94 patents from InterDigital and 44 from IPR Licensing. Unfortunately, the prices paid are not known. In addition to the InterDigital deal last year, Intel also spent $75 million in April on buying a portfolio of wifi, LTE and wireline home networking patents and applications from Aware Inc. It’s also worth remembering that, along with its partner Google, Intel was left disappointed after being outbid by the Rockstar consortium for the Nortel patents back in June 2011. So, the company has been actively looking to bolster its position for quite a while. As Mike says, there is no reason to believe that it will not continue to do so.
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