Following Mirasys’ recent announcement of a patent licence agreement with ObjectVideo, the surveillance industry looks set to tighten up on patent infringement to protect innovation and drive competition. ObjectVideo is currently taking legal action against Bosch, Samsung and Sony in the US.
Whilst patent infringement is widely adhered to in other business verticals, the surveillance industry is relatively new to this concept.
1. Levelling the playing field
One of the questions I am often asked is ‘why do we need patents?’
The simple answer is that when a company, big or small, develops an innovative or unique technology, it needs a way to protect its intellectual property to ensure that it can derive revenue from the investment made in developing that technology.
In the case of small companies, this can be essential for ensuring future success.
Without the ability to protect inventions, it would be easy for competitors to copy innovative designs, ideas or methods without having to make the up-front investment in research and development.
Larger companies that already have the manufacturing capacity and go-to-market resources would end up dominating the market because of this very issue.
Without patents and licensing, the competitive landscape can become inherently skewed.
2. Safeguarding innovation within the industry
CCTV systems are becoming more and more sophisticated and new technologies are constantly being brought to market.
As the PC-based recording solution becomes more prevalent, we are likely to see an increase in the amount of functionality available within these solutions, like video content analysis.
However, to ensure that the industry can continue to evolve and new product development is not stifled by larger companies, we need to ensure that small innovative companies are supported and encouraged to drive positive change in the industry by ensuring their patent rights are protected.
3. A legal requirement
When purchasing a surveillance system, it is important to ensure that all components, including the recorder, cameras and video analytics, are appropriately licensed and protected from patent infringement.
Many recording solutions take advantage of licensable components and with that in mind, manufacturers of surveillance solutions are obliged to pay a licence fee to the company that originally invented the technology and holds the patents for the use of the technology.
When these patents are enforced, implementing the technology without some kind of patent licensing agreement in place would count as a violation of this patent, both at the manufacturer level and at the end user level.
This would legally allow the patent holder to seek compensation from both parties for patent infringement.
4. Protecting channel partners
Patent rules also apply to channel partners and distributors. This means that if a channel partner distributes a surveillance solution which infringes patent laws, they are also subject to legal proceedings and fines alongside the manufacturer and end-user.
In concept, this is very much like distributing music without paying the record companies or musicians that first created that music.
We have seen recently how ObjectVideo, a company holding a significant number of video content analysis patents, has chosen to enforce their patents.
As such, anyone using video analytics features, such as trip wires, that are patented by ObjectVideo, without having licensed those patents, may be infringing these legally protected inventions, and so it is in the interests of channel distributors to work with manufacturers who look after their interests through acknowledging and respecting this.
5. Developing products
So when are patent licences not needed? The reality is that not all businesses set out to develop features that are patentable, and often vendors try to improve on existing technologies in order to drive their business forward.
It may be the case that a product development draws on methods and patents that have just become publically available after having been protected by patents in the past.
But the point remains that patents are still an essential part of driving innovation, and in order for innovators to retain their incentive to innovate, and for an industry to remain competitive, they must become better respected.
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