The world"s No. 2 PC manufacturer, Hewlett-Packard has filed an infringement lawsuit against Gateway over charges that Gateway did not extend licensing contracts on its patents. Officials involved in the case, which was filed in San Diego, said the suit is a last-resort effort by the Palo Alto, Calif., PC giant to get the extensions after negotiations between the two manufacturers broke down. Bob Mayes, an attorney in HP"s legal department, told internetnews.com the company doesn"t wish to pursue the licensing disagreement through the courts, but felt it had no choice.
Officials at HP, he said, still want to peacefully resolve the issue before it goes further. "We do not want to protract litigation and unfortunately litigation is always the last recourse in a licensing program," he said. "We aren"t afraid to use the tools, but we don"t want to if we don"t have to; we"d rather resolve this in an appropriate business environment rather than the courts. However, we had to take this action to protect our IP," he added.