Nintendo avoids yet another patent infringement suit over controllers

Nintendo prevailed in yet another patent infringement lawsuit about its controllers for the Wii and GameCube. A 2007 suit from Fenner Investments Ltd. sued Nintendo and Microsoft for the joystick ports on their consoles.

The patent held by Fenner (#6,297,751) is for a low-power interface with standard 5 volt peripherals that "includes a bi-directional buffer circuit and a pulse generator which, together, generate a digital pulse signal, representing a joystick coordinate position, based on an input analog measurement signal."

The company had originally named Sony in the suit as well but it was later dropped from proceedings. A jury trial was scheduled to take place today, and both Nintendo and Microsoft filed counterclaims for declaratory judgment against the litigant company.

Last night, US District Court Judge Leonard Davis dismissed the case and ruled that there was no need to continue with a jury trial.

Nintendo's Senior Vice President, Legal and General Counsel, Rick Flamm said, "[We] vigorously defend patent lawsuits when we firmly believe that we have not infringed another party's patent, despite the risks that this policy entails. I would like to express our sincere appreciation for the tireless efforts of our legal team, which represented us so well."

And Nintendo's legal team certainly has been busy in Texas. Last summer, Texas company Anascape filed a patent infringement suit against Nintendo for the design and implementation of the analog sticks in its Wii Classic and GameCube controllers. That case, however, resulted in a $21 million victory for Anascape. Nintendo has already released a replacement design for the Wii Classic Controller in Japan which is expected to come to retail in the Summer there, and then subsequently worldwide.