Motorola Inc. said it has filed its lawsuit in the Federal District Court for the Northern District of Illinois against Qualcomm Inc. and Shieldmate Robotics of Itasca, Ill.
Motorola previously announced its intention to file the suit against Qualcomm after it claimed that Qualcomm’s new Code Division Multiple Access Q phone copied the basic look and functions as well as marketing literature of Motorola’s StarTac wearable cellular phone.
Shieldmate is a long-time supplier of cellular telephone housings and shielding to Motorola’s Cellular Subscriber Sector (SCC) and is the main supplier of the company’s StarTac phone housings, said Motorola.
Motorola said that Shieldmate received detailed engineering drawings of the StarTac phone housing, subject to a nondisclosure agreement, and worked on the design and creation of the molding tools used to manufacture StarTac phone housing components used by CSS in the StarTac phone, but also in certain other products.
“They have clearly taken part in the manufacture of an infringing product (the Q phone), and we can’t see how that happened without inappropriate transfer of confidential proprietary information and knowhow,” said the company.
Claims made against Qualcomm in Motorola’s lawsuit include trade dress infringement, unfair competition under the Lanham Act, dilution of Motorola’s trademarks under the new Federal Antidilution Act, design patent infringement, intentional interference with and inducement to breach contract (Motorola’s non-disclosure agreements with Shieldmate), deceptive trade practices and consumer fraud. Claims made against Shieldmate include breach of contract, trade dress infringement and unjust enrichment.
Motorola said it is seeking a preliminary injunction to stop all of Qualcomm’s and Shieldmate’s activities with respect to the Q phone.
Qualcomm already has filed suit in San Diego federal court asking for a declaratory judgment ruling that Qualcomm’s products do not infringe any patents held by Motorola. Shieldmate declined to comment.
