BT has filed a lawsuit against game company Valve for allegedly infringing on four of its patents.
In its complaint filed in US District Court of Delaware, BT said that it had informed Valve on the violations many times but it did not give any response.
The lawsuit said: “On multiple occasions, BT has notified Valve of its infringement of the Patents-In-Suit, which incorporate patented technologies that include, inter alia, digital rights management, broadcasting, voice and chat, and messaging, and requested that Valve enter intodiscussions with BT to address it, e.g., through a licensing arrangement.”
Valve, a game developer, publisher and digital distribution company, uses technologies invented by BT in its broad range of products and services.
BT said that Value has seen value addition for its product and services which feature its patented technologies.
The telecoms company said Valve continued to infringe on its patents “willfully and wantonly”, even as it made several attempts to resolve the issue amicably.
In the lawsuit, BT claims damages for Valve’s infringement in the past and to avoid the company from using its patented technologies without permission.
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Patents allegedly infringed by Valve include the Gittins Patent, the Newton Patent, the Beddus Patent and the Buckley Patent.
BT said that Valve’s digital PC games distribution platform Steam infringes on the four patents.
A BT spokesperson was quoted by Arstechnica as saying: "This is simply about protecting BT’s intellectual property rights. The patents in question cover technologies which Valve has built services upon.
"We will continue to consider all of the options available to protect BT’s intellectual property rights and our investment in innovation."
In 2011, BT filed a lawsuit against Google in a Delaware court alleging that some of Google's services infringe on six of its patents.
BT claimed that the search engine company's services such as Android Market, Google Search, Google Maps, Google+ and Google Offers violate patents owned by it.
In turn, Google also filed patent infringement lawsuit against BT in February 2013.
In 2012, New Jersey-based intellectual property owner Suffolk Technologies, which acquired two patents from BT, sued Google and US internet service provider AOL for infringing its patents, BBC reported.
