Intellectual property

　　知識產權

　　Inventive warfare

　　發明之戰

　　Battles over patents are becoming fiercer and moreexpensive

　　專利之戰，愈演愈烈，愈烈價更高

　　THIS deal is all about patents.

　　這筆交易歸根結蒂就是謀求專利。

　　That was the near universal view of Google s announcement this week that it was takingover Motorola Mobility, a maker of handsets and other devices, for a colossal $12.5 billion.

　　這是多數人對谷歌本周宣布以125億美元天價收購手機及其他電子產品制造商摩托羅拉這一消息的普遍看法。

　　Indeed, the purchase will provide Google with an awful lot of patents: around 17,000 ofthem issued and another 7,500 pending.

　　實際上，此項交易為谷歌帶來數量極其龐大的專利：約1.7萬項已審批，另外7500項待審批。

　　They should help Google in its efforts to get more smartphones and other mobile devicesrunning on its Android operating system.

　　這些專利有助于谷歌獲得更多運行安卓操作系統的智能手機以及其他移動設備。

　　But it could also make the battles over patents nastier and more costly.

　　但是這也會使對專利的爭奪愈演愈烈，代價更高。

　　A scramble for patents had alreadybegun.

　　專利爭奪戰早已打響。

　　In December four companies, including Microsoft and Apple, paid $450m for around 880patents and applications owned by Novell, an ailing software firm.

　　早在12月，包括微軟及蘋果在內的四間公司就支付境況不佳的Novell4.5億美元以購買約880項專利和應用程序。

　　In July those two and four others, including Research in Motion, maker of the BlackBerry,spent $4.5 billion on 6,000 patents owned by Nortel, a bankrupt Canadiantelecoms-equipment maker.

　　今年七月，其中的兩間公司及包括黑莓廠商動態研究公司在內的另外四家公司購買加拿大倒閉的電信設備廠商Nortel的6000項專利。

　　Before its latest deal, Google bought 1,000 patents from IBM.

　　此前，谷歌就從IBM公司購買了1000項專利。

　　Firms are also suing each other.

　　同時，各公司之間也是糾紛不斷。

　　Apple claims its technology has been copied by Samsung and Motorola in their Androidphones.

　　蘋果聲稱其技術已被三星及摩托羅拉在其安卓系統中盜用。

　　Oracle is suing Google for up to $6 billion, claiming that Android infringes its patents.Microsoft is suing Motorola over Android too.

　　甲骨文公司起訴谷歌公司，稱安卓系統侵權，要求索賠60億美元。

　　Nokia recently settled a similar quarrel with Apple.

　　微軟公司也起訴摩托羅拉的安卓系統。諾基亞公司最近剛剛與蘋果公司解決一個類似沖突。

　　What is going on?

　　這到底是怎么回事?

　　Some say companies are attaching more value to intellectual property.

　　有人說這與各公司更看重知識產權有關。

　　Indeed, the Google deal seems to have been priced on a cost-per-patent basis, causing theshare prices of other firms with lots of patents to rise.

　　實際上，谷歌這筆交易似乎就是通過每項專利的成本估算而最終定價，致使擁有專利眾多的公司的股價攀升。

　　Others, however, think the battles reflect deficiencies in the patent system forcing firms topay vast sums to protect technologies they have developed. The answer is a bit of both.

　　但是，也有人認為此類爭奪正反映了專利認證體系的缺陷迫使公司大筆投入保護其開發技術。答案二者兼有。

　　System failure

　　體系缺陷

　　Kent Walker, one of Google s senior lawyers, grouses at being forced to spend a lot ofmoney defending the company against frivolous lawsuits by rivals.

　　谷歌的一名高級律師肯特?沃克爾就抱怨說，公司不得不花大筆錢應對競爭對手雜七雜八的訴訟。

　　Others counter that as computing goes mobile, it favours information-technology firms thathave invested in research for years and that Google was naiveor idealisticto broadenits IT business without having a stack of patents.

　　有些人則辯解稱，隨著移動電話的計算機化，多年投入于研發的信息技術公司會備受寵愛，而谷歌太幼稚或者說理想化，想在沒有專利儲備的情況下就擴展其IT業務。

　　There is a retort to that, too: that incumbents can use patents as barriers to entry, which iswhy America s antitrust regulators are showing interest in them.

　　對此說法也有不同意見：現有公司可利用專利作為市場準入的障礙這就是為什么美國反壟斷監管者對專利感興趣的原因所在。

　　In April the Department of Justice demanded changes to Novell s patent sale to protectopen-source software.

　　四月，美司法部要求Novell公司對專利出售細則做出變動，以保護開源軟件。

　　Nowadays, innovations in IT usually rely on many small improvements involving numeroustechnologies, which means it is not always clear precisely which inventions a patent covers.

　　時至今日，IT產業的創新大多依賴于眾多技術的點滴改善，這就意味著通常搞不清一項專利到底與哪些發明有關。

　　The open secret is that everyone infringes everyone else s patents in some way.

　　大家都不同程度侵犯彼此的專利，這已是心照不宣。

　　This creates an incentive for firms to build up their patent portfolios to strengthen theirposition in negotiations, leading to what some liken to an arms race.

　　這就無形中促使公司逐漸擴大專利組合，來增加談判籌碼，這多少有些像軍備競賽。

　　The legal tussles usually end in cross-licensing deals, in which small sums of money changehands.

　　法律糾紛通常以協議交換專利使用權而告終，只有少量現金易手。

　　This is considered preferable to a mutually destructive exchange of endless lawsuits.

　　人們普遍接受這要比彼此沒完沒了的訴訟，互相傷害好。

　　The patent battle has become more contentious than ever.

　　專利爭奪戰越來越有爭議，前所未有。

　　One reason is the mobile phone has provided a new platform of computing that firms wantto dominate.

　　原因之一就是移動電話提供了各公司競相搶占的計算新平臺，而各公司對此垂涎欲滴。

　　Also, such a backlog of applications built up at America s patent office now more than 1m,with a waiting time of around three years that standards slipped.

　　還有，申請書在美國專利局堆積如山現在有超過1百萬項待批，總共要等待約三年時間。

　　Dubious patents were granted, helped in part by court rulings that allowed patents to standon some software and business methods that many thought no one could lay claim to.

　　有爭議的專利獲得通過，這部分得益于法庭允許某些軟件及經營模式獲得專利，而這些人們普遍認為沒有人會申請專利。

　　In Europe and Japan, where patentability standards are higher, this is less of a problem.

　　在專利標準較高的歐洲和日本，就沒有此類問題。

　　Making things even more troublesome is that as lawsuits became particuarly lucrative somecompanies entered the fray to feed off them.

　　更麻煩的是訴訟特別有利可圖，一些公司因此加入到混戰當中，以此為業。

　　Non-practicing entities, which have intellectual property but no actual products, includesuch august bodies as the Harvard Medical School.

　　非執業實體機構有知識產權，但是沒有實際產品，哈佛醫學院這類眾相追捧的機構就屬此列。

　　But some NPEs are derided as trolls because their sole purpose seems to be to exploit thelegal system by demanding licensing fees from companies, sometimes for questionablepatents.

　　但是有些非職業實體機構因為其唯一目的就是利用法律體系，從使用公司收取專利費，而被貶稱為誘餌公司。

　　Over the past 15 years, the median award to NPEs of damages for patent infringement hasdoubled while that for other firms has declined.

　　過去15年里，裁決非職業實體機構侵權賠償損失的平均賠償數額增加一倍，而對其他公司的裁決減少。

　　Court rulings in America have begun to clip the trolls beards by making it harder to wininjunctions and by strengthening the criteria for whether an invention is truly non-obvious.

　　美國法院裁決已設法防止誘餌公司鉆空子，使誘餌公司更難獲得禁令并就一項發明是否真的非顯而易知性強化評判標準。

　　Microsoft has seen the number of suits filed in the famously plaintiff-friendly district court ofEastern Texas fall from 17 in 2007 to just two so far this year, says Brad Smith, Microsoft sgeneral counsel. However, as big companies have improved their defences, the trolls havechanged their tactics and are now going after start-ups.

　　在以偏向于原告而出名的德克薩斯州東部的地方法院，對微軟提起的訴訟從2007年的17件降至今年的僅2件，微軟法律總顧問布拉德?史密斯說。但是，隨著大公司勝訴增加，誘餌公司也一改策略，開始覬覦初創公司。

　　New legislation could change things.

　　新法案有望扭轉乾坤。

　　David Kappos, director of America s patent office, says the America Invents Act couldamount to the most sweeping reforms to the US patent system in 175 years.

　　美國專利局局長大衛?卡波斯說，美國發明法有望徹底改變美國175年歷史的專利體系。

　　It is expected to be passed this autumn, Barack Obama has indicated that he will sign it, andbig IT and drug companies support it.

　　該方案預計會在今年秋季通過，巴拉克?奧巴馬已表示他會簽署通過該方案，而且大型IT公司和制藥企業也對該法案給予支持。

　　But many entrepreneurs and venture capitalists do not, arguing that it does not fix any ofthe system s big problems and risks creating new ones.

　　但是許多企業家和風險投資人卻對此嗤之以鼻，認為這不會解決這一體系的大問題，而有制造新問題的風險。

　　The most contentious point is a change to determine who is the rightful inventor.

　　最有爭議的一點是決定合法發明人的定義產生了變化。

　　Instead of being the first to invent, the successful applicant would be the first to file, thestandard used worldwide.

　　美國采用世界通行的標準，法律認可的發明人不再是首位發明人，而是首位成功注冊人。

　　Harmonising America s rules with those in other countries would be a step towards greaterco-operation and efficiency in patent examinations globally.

　　美國的規則與其他國家一致，是為全球專利檢驗加大合作與提高效率邁出的一步。

　　Big companies like the proposal because it gives them more legal certainty that someonewill not appear claiming they came up with the idea first.

　　大公司喜歡這一提議，因為在法律上他們有更大的勝算，確信有些人不會出庭宣稱自己首先想出創意。

　　But inventors like Steve Perlman, the founder of WebTV and other firms, argue that it forcescompanies to file for patents before their inventions are fully developed.

　　但是WebTV及多家公司的創始人史蒂夫?帕爾曼這樣的投資人辯稱，這會迫使公司在發明完全開發出之前就注冊專利。

　　That, says Mr Perlman, would lead to yet more incremental improvements rather than biginnovative steps and put a toll on America s competitiveness.

　　帕爾曼先生說，那會更多地導致創新漸進增長，而非跨越式創新發展，托美國的競爭力的后腿。

　　For the moment, though, companies are amassing ever larger arsenals of patents.

　　盡管如此，現在各公司增加的專利儲備越來越多。

　　Google, for one, was hit by eight lawsuits in April alonemore than in the first five years ofits 13-year existence, says Mr Walker.

　　就拿谷歌來說，四月就接受了八起訴訟比其成立13年歷史中中前五年的接受訴訟都多，沃克爾說。

　　See how far we have strayed from the notion of innovation, that we need to acquirepatents to fend off potential suits, he says of the firm s overall strategy.

　　來看看我們到底已偏離創新概念多遠了。我們需要以獲得專利來防范訴訟，他談到公司的總體戰略時說。

　　That money could have been spent on engineers, to much more productive use.

　　那些錢本可以花在工程師身上，用在刀刃上。

　　詞語解釋

　　1.property n.財產;所有物

　　The property was returned to the original owner.

　　財產已歸還原主。

　　2.warfare n.戰爭;沖突

　　This is as true of warfare as it is of diplomacy.

　　這是真正的戰爭，就像剛才提到的外交。

　　3.announcement n.通告;宣布

　　The government s announcement is seen as a move towards settling the strike.

　　政府的通告已被視為邁向解決罷工問題的一步。

　　4.device n.裝置;設備

　　The data logger device has been fitted to ship s engine room.

　　數字記錄儀裝置已安裝在船只的機艙里。

　　5.nasty a.下流的;令人不快的

　　He is a person with a nasty mind.

　　他是個思想骯臟的人。