Electronics giant Philips is suing Nintendo of America, claiming it owns the rights to motion-sensing controls, and wants the court to completely halt the sale of the Nintendo Wii U in stores as a result of that infringement.
Philips alleges that it owns the patent to a “virtual body control device” that allows users to control interfaces using “intuitive” motions. It also claims that Nintendo’s Wii Remote infringes on a second patent, which refers to a “user interface system based on a pointing device” which kind of describes how the Wii and the Wii U function.
Philips claims it informed Nintendo of its alleged infringement of the first patent in November 2011, and had not informed it of the second patent until today.
Nintendo has neither confirmed nor denied that it agrees with these allegations.
To resolve the issue, Philips wants Nintendo to compensate it for damages caused by its two alleged infringements, as well as a ban on the sale of any products that infringe on the patent in North America.
If the courts agree with Philips, we could be looking at a block on sales of the Wii, Wii Remote, Wii U, Wii U Gamepad, and Wii Mini.
Via Game Informer.
