Vonage could be forced to shut down if it loses patent dispute with Verizon

[mandy]

AT&T filed a lawsuit against VoIP provider Vonage on Friday seeking damages for alleged patent infringement.

The lawsuit comes just days after Vonage settled a patent-infringement lawsuit with telecom provider Sprint Nextel.

In a filing with the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Wisconsin, AT&T alleged that Vonage wilfully infringed an AT&T patent related to telephone systems that allow people to make VoIP calls using standard telephone devices.

In the legal filing, AT&T said it tried to reach an agreement with Vonage to license the patent, but failed, which forced the lawsuit...

full article: http://www.infoworld.com/article/07/10/1...ent_1.html

The ATT patent: http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-bool.html&r=1&f=G&l=50&co1=AND&d=PTXT&s1=6,487,200.PN.&OS=PN/6,487,200&RS=PN/6,487,200