BlackBerry to pay $267 million to settle patent lawsuit

BlackBerry maker Research In Motion Ltd (RIM) will pay $267.5 million to California-based Visto Corp to settle a patent infringement lawsuit.

Visto, which is a wireless e-mail company, had slapped the lawsuit on RIM in a Texas court for patent infringements in 2006.

In its lawsuit, the US company had said that RIM was using its technology without authorisation. Visto's software is used Vodafone, Deutsche Telekom AG's T-Mobile and Sprint Nextel Corp.

But RIM hit back, saying that Visto's patents involved no new inventions. It also filed its counterclaim, leading to a war of lawsuits between the two companies in the US, Canada and Europe.

But RIM and Visto reached an agreement Thursday, with the BlackBerry maker agreeing to pay $267.5 million to settle the case and use Visto's patents in the future.

"The key terms of the settlement involve RIM receiving a perpetual and fully-paid license on all Visto patents, a transfer of certain Visto intellectual property, a one-time payment by RIM of US $ 267.5 million and the parties executing full and final releases in respect of all outstanding worldwide litigation,'' said a statement by the BlackBerry maker here.

The global wireless giant said the settlement will be completed by July 20, 2009.

This is the second time in three years that RIM has to pay a huge amount to settle a patent dispute with another company.

In 2006, the Waterloo-based Canadian giant had paid a whopping $612.5 million to settle a patent dispute with NTP Inc., a Virginia-based patent-holding company.

It had filed the lawsuit against RIM in 2001, claiming that the BlackBerry maker used its patents without authorization to create the push e-mail platform on its smart phones.

After a five-year legal battle, RIM paid $612.5 million to the American company "in full and final settlement of all claims against RIM, as well as for a perpetual, fully-paid up license going forward.''

Compensate for delay to re-credit failed ATM transaction: RBI

India's central bank Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has asked banks to pay account holders a compensation of Rs.100 per day if they delay in re-crediting the amount of a failed ATM transaction beyond 12 days.

"It is mandatory for the banks to reimburse the customers, the amount wrongfully debited on account of failed ATM transactions within a maximum period of 12 working days," the RBI said in a notification.

It also made it compulsory for banks to re-credit customer's account automatically on the 12th day after the failed transaction, without the customer having to make a claim, and told banks to extend the scope of audit to cover cases of delay in reimbursing the customers in these cases.

RBI said it has received complaints against banks violating its instructions and different banks had put in place different cut-off limits for cash withdrawals for other bank customers.

If the banks fail to do so in the stipulated period, they would have to pay a fine of Rs.100 per day from the 13th day onwards, said the notification. The penalty amount will also be credited on the same day when the bank pays back the debited amount for the failed ATM transaction to the customer, the notification said.

The RBI notification also said that the issuer bank is entitled to claim such compensation from the acquirer bank, if the later is responsible for the delay. Also, the ATM network operators will have to compensate the banks for any delay on their part.

Chinese film producers face financial woes

Chinese film producers are struggling to make ends meet even though the country's movie industry earns good profits, say officials.

Hollywood blockbuster "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen" collected 400 million yuan ($58.4 million) in China after the movie was released worldwide June 24, breaking the record set by "Titanic" 10 years ago in the country.

"Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince", which hit the Chinese market Friday, is also expected to do good business in China.

The country's film business is profitable as Chinese movies earn good profits.

For instance, "If You Are The One", a comedy made by Chinese director Feng Xiaogang, earned 325 million yuan this year. "Silver Medalist", a black comedy by young director Ning Hao, grossed 100 million yuan this spring, says Han Sanping, chairman of China Film Group Corporation.

Some industry critics, however, argue that domestic film producers are still struggling to make their ends meet.

The box office returns are usually divided into three parts: 50 percent goes to the cinema hall owners, 10 percent to the distributors and 40 percent to producers. A film with an investment of 80 million yuan must earn at least 200 million yuan so that its producers could make their ends meet, Han said recently in an interview with the Shanghai-based Wen Hui Daily.

China produced 406 films in 2008, according to a report produced by the Chinese Film Association in June. The total box office returns in China last year stood at 4.3 billion yuan and 60 percent or 2.58 billion came from the domestic movies, he added.

"In a mature film industry, the box office is not the only source of revenue," said Jiang Defu, director of the marketing department under the China Film Group Corporation.

In Hollywood, 30 percent of the revenues come from the box office, while the remaining 70 percent come from other sources, including advertisement, he said.

"We still need to learn from their experience. Chinese film producers should not only attract audience into cinema but also explore the market out of the cinema (theatres)," he said.

Allahabad Bank's Q1 profit zooms 224 percent

State-run Allahabad Bank posted a net profit of Rs.302.86 crore (Rs.3.02 billion) for the first quarter of 2009 as compared to Rs.93.36 crore for the same period last year, a top company official said here Saturday.

The net profit was up by 224 percent due to higher investment trading profit of Rs.214 crore, up from Rs.32.2 crore a year ago.

"A volatile money market offers opportunity to make treasury profits," Chairman and Managing Director K.R. Kamath told reporters.

Kamath said last fiscal's (2008-09) treasury income level of Rs.575 crore would be maintained during 2009-10.

Apart from trading profit, Kamath attributed jump in quarterly profit over previous year to growth in net interest margin (NIM) to 3 percent from 2.6 percent a year ago.

"We expect to maintain NIM at 2.88 percent during the current year," he said.

Morgan Stanley India allowed to deal in bonds

The Indian arm of US-based merchant banker Morgan Stanley was Saturday authorised to undertake primary dealer business in government securities and bonds with effect from July 20.

The company said in a subsequent statement it has, accordingly, appointed Manoj Kumar Swain the chief executive of primary dealer operations and that it would commence these activities in India from Monday.

"The new licence, along with our established non-banking finance business, provides us with a fully integrated onshore fixed income platform in India and enables us to offer a comprehensive suite of services and solutions to our local and global clients."

Inside Scoop: Google India plans new IM Client "Google Baat Cheet"

Google Baat Cheet to replace Gtalk in Indian market

If we believe the latest inside information from Google India, It is planning a brand new instant messaging application named as “Google Baat Cheet.” With a Hindi name it is almost clear that it is directed to Indian market only. It is believed that it will replace Gtalk, which has failed in Indian Market as most of the Google IM users sticking to Gmail in-built chat client.Video, Audio chatting, Indic language support and 3rd party messenger support(possibilty) are the few key features of Google Baat Cheet.Google Baat Chet is being launched with a motive to capture the huge Instant Messaging market in India. Hindi and other Indic language support will be a main feature of this IM Client, it is being done keeping in mind the emerging online vernacular language market in India.Google India has planned “Google Baat Cheet” for a Q4 launch this year. Detail information is still not available. But we are digging hard to know more about this exciting product.

Youtube Hindi version to launch on July 30th

According to the latest inside scoop, Youtube India will come up with the Youtube Hindi version on July 30th. This seems to be an important step in the path of Indic language inclusion in Google applications which have been earlier included to Google Mail and Blogger, however no official information is still available about the launch.

If my sources are to be believed, Youtube Hindi is coming really soon, soon as July 30th. Youtube Hindi will have whole Hindi interface which will enable users to write about their videos in Hindi by using Google Transliteration capabilities (as used in Blogger and Gmail) and even comment in Hindi. This is an next important step for popularizing Youtube in India after launching Youtube India specific version on May 7 last year.Youtube India users have one more thing to smile about after Hindi inclusion, Indian users will now be able to monatise their videos on Youtube. The monatisation process will depend on the number of hits your video will receive. About Youtube:
Founded in February 2005, YouTube is the leader in online video, and the premier destination to watch and share original videos worldwide through a Web experience. YouTube allows people to easily upload and share video clips on www.YouTube.com and across the Internet through websites, mobile devices, blogs, and email.Curretly Youtube is available in following languages
English (UK)
English (US)
Español (España)
Español (Latinoamérica)
Français
Italiano
Nederlands
Polski
Português (Brasil)
Pyccĸий
Svenska
Čeština
中文 (简体)
中文 (繁體)
日本語
한국어

via Byte Gyan