Patent Troll ‘Unwired Planet’ Files Patent Lawsuits Against Apple, Google

Patent troll Unwired Planet on Thursday files patent infringement lawsuits against Apple and Google, claiming that the companies infringed on 10 patents relating to smartphones, cloud computing, digital content stores, location-based services, mapping, advertising and push notifications.

In the complained Unwired Planet CEO Mike Mulica writes:

“Apple and Google generate substantial revenues from devices and services that rely on the intellectual property that Unwired Planet developed and patented over the last 15 years. They should compensate us for the use of our patented technologies, which are foundational to mobility.”

Mulica further says of the lawsuit:

“Today’s actions follow a careful review that we launched in late 2011 as we began to transform Unwired Planet into an Intellectual Property company. This litigation marks a key step in our multi-pronged strategy to maximize shareholder value through the licensing of our robust portfolio of patents and to protect our IP through litigation against unlicensed parties as necessary.”

Apple products being targeted include the iPhone, iPad and iPod alongside Apple’s App Store, iTunes music store, Safari Web browser and iAd platform among other software based platforms. Google in the meantime has been targeted over its Motorola and Nexus smartphone and tablet lines alongside Google platform services including the Play Store, Google Search, Adwords, Google Maps, Google Wallet and others.

Google and Apple representatives have not yet publicly answered the accusations listed in the lawsuit.

Do you think patent trolls such as Unwired Planet should be allowed to repeatedly build patent portfolio’s they never plan to use for their own products?