Week 12 Blog 1 - Sony vs. Red Digital

On Patentlyo, I read an article about a battle going on between Sony and Red Digital Cinema Camera Company. While I was pretty familiar with Sony, I did not know about Red Digital. I found out that they are an American manufacturer of digital cinematography tools, and that many of their products have been used to shoot several TV shows and movies. Their stylish cameras have gained widespread attention, along with the fact that the founder of this company, Jim Jannard is also the founder of Oakley.
The battle between these two companies started when Red Digital sued Sony over two patents a couple months ago, for U.S Patent #8,358,357 and #8,174,560. In this lawsuit, Red Digital demanded Sony to stop the production and also destroy their infringing products, such as the F65, F5, and F55 models.
Well, Sony has come back this month and countersued Red Digital for patent infringement. They have actually sued them over seven patents, for U.S Patent #5,442,718, #5,523,795, #5,999,213, #6,009,233, #6,423,993, #7,138,617, and #7,304,287. These patents are all directed to digital camera technology, as  they are about "a method of and apparatus for setting up electronic device" and an "apparatus and method for recording and reproducing a video signal with camera setting data."Similar to Red Digital's demands on the Sony products, Sony has also demanded Red Digital to stop the production of their products such as the Red One, Epic, Redmote, and Scarlet cameras, and to also destroy any remaining ones in the market.
It appears like this is an intense battle. The author of this article discusses how although this case is only taking place in the United States for now, Sony is attempting to enlarge this dispute by bringing it to a global scale. This may be a disadvantage for Red Digital as Sony is a large company than them, meaning that Sony also has a stronger patent portfolio. I think that Red Digital may suffer to defend itself.

http://www.patentlyo.com/patent/2013/04/sony-v-red-digital-redcom.html
http://www.worldipreview.com/news/sony-and-red-digital-cinema-locked-in-patent-tussle