SAN FRANCISCO and CALGARY – Shaw Communications has been hit by a lawsuit that seeks to halt the rollout of its new voice-controlled platform BlueSky TV.
The Kudelski Group, with headquarters in Switzerland and Phoenix, AZ, says it holds over 5,300 issued and pending patents worldwide. Its OpenTV, Inc. and Nagravision S.A. subsidiaries have filed a patent infringement suit in the Federal Court of Canada, alleging that Shaw’s system infringes six of its Canadian patents.
The asserted patents “relate to a wide variety of features in Shaw’s system, including its PayTV purchasing, distribution, viewership monitoring, and interactive television systems”, the company said in a statement.
The lawsuit seeks a preliminary injunction prohibiting deployment of Shaw’s BlueSky TV, which is a licensed version of Comcast’s X1 platform. Shaw launched BlueSky TV in Calgary in January, brought it to Vancouver in February, and said that it would continue the rollout in its various markets over the coming months.
When contacted Monday by Cartt.ca, a Shaw spokesperson confirmed that a claim was served on Shaw on February 24, 2017. “Shaw has engaged counsel and is assessing the claim, but otherwise we have no comment at this time”, continued the emailed response.
