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MP3 Player Maker Creative Hints At Patent Claim Against Apple iPod

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on December 9, 2005 - 4:32am.
London - Consumer electronics firm Creative Technology, maker of the Zen line of portable MP3 and video players, has told the BBC it intends to "pursue aggressively" a patent it holds on player software that would likely include Apple's iPod. The company -- which this week introduced its 30GB Zen Vision:M video and MP3 player -- won a patent in August that covers a hierarchical, multi-screen menu system for organizing files on a portable player. "We will pursue all manufacturers that use the same navigation system," Creative CEO Sim Wong told the BBC. "Hopefully this will be friendly, but people have to respect intellectual property." In a thinly-veiled reference to the marketing success for the iPod, Wong added, "We are focused on the technology…this is the key difference between a technology company and a branding company."
tags: Apple iPod | MP3 Player Maker | Creative Hints At Patent |

MP3 Player Maker Creative Wins Patent on User Interface

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on August 30, 2005 - 4:54am.
Scotts Valley, Calif. -- Consumer electronics firm Creative Technology announced on Tuesday that it has been granted a U.S. patent on its user interface technology for portable media players. The "Zen Patent" covers technology found both in Creative's own Zen and Nomad MP3 players, as well as in Apple's iPod. Creative said the technology covered by the patent describes "a method, performed by software executing on the processor of a portable music playback device, that automatically files tracks according to hierarchical structure of categories to organize tracks in a logical order. A user interface is utilized to change the hierarchy, view track names, and select tracks for playback or other operations."
tags: Creative | MP3 Player Maker | Patent on User Interface |

D&M Holdings to Shutter MP3 Player Maker Rio Audio

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on August 26, 2005 - 6:39am.
Tokyo -- Japanese consumer electronics firm D&M Holdings, whose brands include Denon, Marantz, ReplayTV and Rio, announced on Friday that it plans to exit the portable MP3 player market with the closure of its struggling Rio Audio business. The company agreed in July to sell the money-losing Rio's technology assets for $7 million, to chipmaker SigmaTel. D&M said it decided to close Rio, which it purchased in 2003, because "the mass-market portable digital audio player market was not a strong enough strategic fit with the company's core and profitable premium consumer electronics brands to warrant additional investment in the category," the company said in a statement, also citing "the costs required to effectively scale and compete in this sector, where competition has grown intense." The company expects to realize a loss of $25 million in shut-down related costs for the global Rio operations during its fiscal second quarter, in addition to a $22 million loss from discontinued operations at its U.S. Rio unit. "The digital audio market is evolving in such a way that our competitive advantage will be to focus on creating premium home network products that are designed for compatibility with a variety of client devices and services," said D&M Holdings president Vic Pacor.
tags: Music | D&M Holdings | MP3 Player Maker | Rio Audio |