A small technology company in New York has announced that it is preparing to sue Google, claiming that the tech giant has violated copyright related to Internet phone calling software through its Google Talk service.
Jerry Weinberger, CEO of Rates Technology Inc. (RTI), stated that his company was the first to invest in and successfully research technology that enables phone calls over the Internet.
According to Weinberger, approximately 120 companies worldwide have purchased licenses from RTI before investing in Internet Phone services, including industry giants such as Lucent, Cisco, IBM, Yahoo, and Microsoft. He asserts that the technology known as Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) has belonged to RTI for a long time, and he is puzzled as to why Google was unaware of this.
RTI filed a lawsuit against Google two months ago in federal court, accusing the company of technology copyright infringement and seeking damages amounting to $5 million, unless the two companies reach an out-of-court settlement.
Google has not commented directly on the lawsuit but has indicated that the company will strive to dismiss all “unmeritorious” or “frivolous” lawsuits. The outcome of this lawsuit remains uncertain, but the news has already caused Google’s stock price to drop by $5.17, closing at $414.98 per share on the Nasdaq market yesterday.
Internet phone technology is currently one of the cheapest and fastest-growing communication technologies in the world. Microsoft recently partnered with telecommunications giant MCI to launch a low-cost global Internet phone service in December, competing alongside Skype, Yahoo, and Google.
THIEN TRANG
