Tech Shout!

A little known and closely held company known as Texas MP3 Technologies is taking on Samsung Electronics, Apple and Sandisk with a patent infringement lawsuit. The three internally known companies are being sued by the Texas-based company that claims the three are infringing its patent for portable music players.

The suit was filed on February 16 in Marshall, Texas. In the complaint, Texas MP3 Technologies has alleged infringement on U.S. patent 7,065,41, which was awarded in June 2006 to multimedia chip-maker SigmaTel. The patent covers “an MPEG portable sound reproducing system and a method for reproducing sound data compressed using the MPEG method.”

The lawsuit targets the music players made by three companies that include Apple’s top-selling iPod music player and Sandisk’s Sansa music player.

A month later, in July 2006, SigmaTel said that it had sold the patent to a Dallas-based patent licensing agency since it believed the agency would be better able to take advantage of its potential value.

According to a statement by SigmaTel when it announced the sale of the patent, “Because these are such basic patents to digital music, we believe it will be difficult to design around these patents and have a commercially viable player.”

SigmaTel also said that it had retained international rights to the patent and has insulated its customers from any legal action that is associated with the patent.

Whether Texas MP3 Technologies is the Dallas-based company that bought the patent from SigmaTel or whether it acquired them from somewhere else is unclear.