Quarterhill Inc (QTRHF)

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Wi-Lan mentioned in the Marshall, Texas newsletter where the trial is being held. A good, quick update of what has happened thus far in court.

http://www.marshallnewsmessenger.com/news/patent-trial-of-apple-wi-lan-continues/article_ae2b0652-ac48-5ef4-adfa-27edd9421ebc.html

The patent infringement trial of Wi-LAN versus Apple continued Thursday in the U.S. District Court here with the defense attorney questioning the plaintiff’s expert witness on the significance of his survey.
“It’s basically trying to measure their value of increased download speed,” said Jeffery Prince, survey expert for plaintiff Wi-LAN in the patent infringement case of Wi-LAN versus Apple, sharing the results of his survey.
Prince, a professor at Indiana University who specializes in measuring consumer preferences, said through the 1001 respondents who took his survey, he determined that speed is an important feature for smartphone users, and that consumers are willing to pay $79.34 for a smart phone with double times the data speed.
When asked by Apple’s attorney, Luke Dauchot, if this was his first time doing a survey relative to cell phones, he said yes. When asked if his survey related to a generic smartphone, he said yes.
The attorney argued that Prince didn’t include certain terms in the survey such as what Mbps (megabit per second) meant and what Gb (gigabyte) meant.
“Nowhere in your survey did you explain to a consumer of what ‘Mbps means,’ so it would be pure speculation on your part to say that the people who took your survey understood what ‘Mbps’ meant,” said Dauchot.
“In order to have a meaningful survey to present we ought to have some measure of confidence that the folks who took the survey understood what they were surveying about,” said Dauchot.
The attorney argued that while Prince’s survey addressed download speed, Apple is not accused of infringing technology related to download.
“The issue is upload,” he said.
“Assuming I’m right, you surveyed for something unrelated to the case,” said Dauchot.
When asked by Jennifer Truelove, representing Wi-LAN, if he believed that his survey was tainted because he omitted definitions for certain terms, Prince said no.
“There are actual smartphone owners,” he said. “Actual smartphone owners don’t know what it means. I felt the conservative approach would be to not spell it out because it would lead them to value it more than they would.”
He said of the 1001 survey takers, only 19 were dissatisfied with the survey.
“I found the very low rate of any negativity to be very encouraging,” he said.
The trial resumes today at 8:30 a.m. in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas- Marshall Division, with U.S. Judge Rodney Gilstrap presiding.