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Friday, February 27, 2009
Skyward Mobile’s bankruptcy fueled by MobiTV lawsuit
By Efrain Viscarolasaga
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The Chapter 7 bankruptcy documents filed last week by Wakefield-based mobile application developer Skyward Mobile LLC indicate a total of $3.6 million worth of liabilities. But it seems that a $400,000 settlement claim to a California-based mobile video delivery platform developer and the battle over its intellectual property may have been the company’s final undoing.
The settlement, due to MobiTV Inc., stems from a patent infringement lawsuit filed in Massachusetts federal court in 2007. The suit alleged that Skyward Mobile founder and CEO Jeremy De Bonet, who was an employee of MobiTV for five years and CTO for nearly four years, took patent-protected source code and technology he helped develop for MobiTV and marketed it through Skyward Mobile.
In its court filings, MobiTV called the alleged infringement “continued brazen misappropriation” of its technology.
MobiTV originally hired De Bonet as a contract worker while he was a Ph.D. student at MIT in early 2001, but appointed him full-time CTO later that year, with him working from an office in Boston, according to the filings. De Bonet abruptly resigned from MobiTV in 2006, allegedly taking with him source code and refusing an exit interview.
Two months later, De Bonet formed Skyward Mobile with Mike Wessler, a former researcher at Sun Microsystems Labs and a member of former Vice President Al Gore’s technology staff.
According to MobiTV’s lawsuit: “It took MobiTV several years to develop the technology and platform that Skyward was able to develop and present to the market in only a matter of months — a feat made possible only through the use and misappropriation of MobiTV’s proprietary technology and intellectual property.”
The technology surrounding the lawsuit deals with streaming video and applications to a variety of mobile phones, rather than having to redevelop a given application for each kind of handset. In an interview with Mass High Tech in 2007, De Bonet said he and 20 employees had built 50 applications with his company’s technology in the previous four months.
Over the course of the legal wranglings between the two companies, MobiTV requested an undisclosed amount of financial damages, as well as an injunction against Skyward prohibiting the use of the technology in question. While court documents did not disclose the terms of the settlement, MobiTV was listed as a creditor in Skyward Mobile’s bankruptcy filing, with Skyward owing the company $400,000 for a “settlement claim.” The case was dismissed with prejudice in June 2008, after the two sides filed a joint request for an extension claiming that they were close to a settlement.
De Bonet, as well as lawyers for both Skyward Mobile and MobiTV did not respond to requests for comment.
Skyward’s flight plan
Eight years after being hired by MobiTV while still at MIT, Skyward Mobile founder De Bonet shuts down the company
January 2001
Jeremy De Bonet hired by MobiTV as an independent contractor while a student at MIT
November 2001
De Bonet hired as CTO of MobiTV
January 2006
De Bonet resigns from MobiTV
March 2006
De Bonet forms Skyward Mobile
April 2007
MobiTV files lawsuit
May 2008
Both parties say they are preparing a formal settlement
June 2008
Lawsuit dismissed with prejudice
February 2009
Skyward Mobile files for Chapter 7 bankruptcy protection
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