Another day, another lawsuit. Wi-LAN (http://www.wilan.com), a technology innovation and licensing company, has commenced litigation in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas (the lawsuit capital of the world, it seems), against Apple and several other companies for patent infringement.

In its filing, WiLAN claims that these companies have infringed and continue to infringe WiLAN’s U.S. Patent No. 5,515,369 by making and/or selling various products enabled with Bluetooth technology including cellular handsets and personal notebook computers. WiLAN will be represented in this action by McKool Smith.

Also included in the lawsuit are Acer, Atheros, Belkin, Broadcom, Dell, D-Link, Gateway, HP, Intel, Lenova, LG Electronics, Marvell Semiconductor, Motorola, Personal Communications Devices, Sony, Texas Instruments, Toshiba and UTStarcom. What? Not Microsoft? Why not simply sue the whole tech industry?

In 2007, Wi-LAN filed a similar lawsuit against 22 technology companies -- including Apple -- in two actions claiming patent infringement. Wi-LAN, which licenses patents for telecom products, said the suits against chip suppliers, equipment vendors and electronics retailers have commenced in the Eastern District of Texas, Marshall Division. The filings claim that the companies infringe Wi-LAN patents -- related to Wi-Fi and power consumption in DSL products -- by making or selling such products as wireless routers, modems and personal notebook computers.

-- Dennis Sellers