Toshiba has until Thursday to file any opposition to MPEG LA's motion to have its breach of contract complaint against Toshiba remanded to the New York State Supreme Court from which Toshiba removed it, said an order signed by U.S. District Judge Jesse Furman in Manhattan. MPEG LA would then have until July 9 to respond to Toshiba's opposition, Furman's order said. In its complaint (see 1506220040), ATSC patent pool administrator MPEG LA alleged Toshiba sold DTV sets for years without paying the proper ATSC royalties. MPEG LA also accused Toshiba of “unjust enrichment,” alleging it “benefited from portraying itself as having a pooled patent license with MPEG LA without properly compensating MPEG LA for this benefit.” Toshiba removed the complaint to federal from state court in late May on “diversity jurisdiction” and other grounds that MPEG LA argued in its motion to remand are “baseless.” According to the MPEG LA motion, “unjust enrichment (and breach of contract for that matter) is most assuredly a state-law claim." In court papers, Toshiba hasn’t addressed the allegations that it failed to pay the ATSC royalties it owes MPEG LA. MPEG LA alleged the payments stopped about five years ago, around when Toshiba closed its Toshiba America Consumer Products CE subsidiary in Wayne, New Jersey, and merged that operation into the Toshiba America Information Systems computing subsidiary in Irvine, California (see 1007080097). Toshiba representatives haven't commented. After years of speculation, Toshiba in late January announced it was pulling the plug on its unprofitable North American TV business. The company said it would cease TV development and sales operations in Irvine and license the business to Taiwan’s Compal Electronics, the original design manufacturer with which Toshiba has had a longstanding supply relationship (see 1501290047).

Harman International declined comment on a federal appeals court opinion reversing a lower court’s dismissal of a class-action shareholder complaint that alleged senior company management “knowingly and recklessly propped up” the company’s stock price by overinflating its personal navigational devices business to make the company a more attractive acquisition target (see 1506230039). The U.S. Appeals Court for the D.C. Circuit remanded the case to the U.S. District Court in D.C. for “further proceedings.” Harman “as a matter of practice” doesn’t comment on pending litigation, company spokesman Darrin Shewchuk emailed us Tuesday.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit reversed a lower court’s dismissal of a class-action shareholder complaint that alleged senior Harman International management “knowingly and recklessly propped up” the company’s stock price by overinflating Harman’s personal navigational devices (PNDs) business to make Harman a more attractive acquisition target. The U.S. District Court in D.C. “dismissed the complaint for failure to state a claim,” concluding that Harman’s alleged statements “fell within the statutory safe harbor for forward-looking statements,” said the appeals court opinion Tuesday. But the appeals court ruled otherwise, saying the complaint, filed by municipal employee pension plans in Arkansas and Florida, “plausibly alleges that those statements were not entitled to safe harbor protection because the accompanying cautionary statements were misleading insofar as they failed to account for historical facts about PNDs that would have been important to a reasonable investor,” the opinion said. In reversing the complaint’s dismissal, the appeals court remanded the case to the district court for “further proceedings,” it said. Representatives of Harman and the pension plans didn’t comment.

The U.S. District Court in Los Angeles granted a partial motion to dismiss a data breach class action suit against Sony Pictures Entertainment after the breach of sensitive and personal information of at least 15,000 former and current Sony employees, said a post Tuesday on the Hunton & Williams’ privacy and information security law blog. The class action against Sony alleged negligence, breach of implied contract, violation of the California Customer Records Act, violation of the California Confidentiality of Medical Information Act, violation of the Unfair Competition Law, declaratory judgment, violation of Virginia Code 18.2‑186.6, and violation of Colorado Revised Statutes 6-1-716, the post said. “Sony moved to dismiss for lack of Article III standing under Rule 12(b)(1) and failure to state a claim under Rule 12(b)(6),” it said. Sony’s challenge against Rule 12(b)(1) was rejected, as the court said the “personally identifiable information (PII) was stolen and posted on file-sharing websites for identity thieves to download, and that the PII was used to send threatening e-mails to employees and their families,” the post said. Challenges to Rule 12(b)(6) were both granted and denied. The plaintiffs' argument that implied contract claim was breached was dismissed, as were the claims the breach violated the California Customer Records Act, and the Virginia and Colorado breach notification claims, the post said. Negligence claims against Sony were granted and the Unfair Competition Law claim also advanced, the post said. Sony had no immediate comment.

ATSC patent pool administrator MPEG LA wants its breach of contract complaint against Toshiba remanded to the New York State Supreme Court from which Toshiba removed it, MPEG LA said Thursday in its memorandum of law in U.S. District Court in Manhattan supporting its motion to remand the case. MPEG LA alleges Toshiba sold DTV sets without paying the proper ATSC royalties, the memorandum said. MPEG LA also accuses Toshiba of “unjust enrichment,” alleging Toshiba “benefited from portraying itself as having a pooled patent license with MPEG LA without properly compensating MPEG LA for this benefit,” it said. Toshiba removed the complaint to federal from state court in late May on “diversity jurisdiction” and other grounds that MPEG LA now considers “baseless,” it said. In court filings, Toshiba hasn’t addressed the allegations that it failed to pay the ATSC royalties it owes MPEG LA. Toshiba representatives didn’t comment.

Rovi prevailed in a patent infringement proceeding in Italy, it said Monday. CE companies Card Mania and Italvideo alleged that the Italian portions of two European Rovi patents -- EP 0969662 and EP 1377049 -- are invalid and not infringed. Rovi counterclaimed that the patents are valid and infringed, and the Court of Turin ruled in May that Rovi is entitled to a combined judgment of roughly $1 million. The court had previously asserted the patents valid and infringed by Card Mania and Italvideo.

U.S. District Judge Philip Gutierrez let Flo & Eddie's lawsuit in Los Angeles against SiriusXM move forward Wednesday as a class action. Flo & Eddie, which owns the copyright to The Turtles' "Happy Together" and the rest of that band's music library, claims SiriusXM failed to pay royalties to the company for all of The Turtles' pre-1972 songs. Gutierrez previously found SiriusXM liable in September for royalties on The Turtles' pre-1972 recordings (see report in the Sept. 24, 2014, issue), but Flo & Eddie had sought a class-action suit in March against SiriusXM to allow other bands to seek royalties on pre-1972 recordings. SiriusXM had opposed class certification because it would be difficult to accurately determine royalties for each band that joined the suit. Gutierrez ruled Wednesday that "a class action is superior to individual litigation to the fair and efficient adjudication of the present controversy” given “SiriusXM’s aggressive litigation tactics thus far, its public statements about intent to appeal adverse decisions, and its decision to continue to perform pre-1972 recordings without authorization.” Sirius XM “treats every single owner of a pre-1972 song the same, namely it doesn't pay them, so it was appropriate for this court to grant class certification,” said Flo & Eddie lawyer Henry Gradstein in a statement. Sirius XM didn’t comment.

The National Music Publishers' Association (NMPA) filed a copyright infringement lawsuit Wednesday against Wolfgang's Vault over claims that the company illegally transmitted concert video and audio recordings via its websites and YouTube. Wolfgang's Vault, whose websites include ConcertVault.com and MusicVault.com, refers to itself as the “largest collection of live audio and video recordings online.” NMPA's complaint, filed with the U.S. District Court in Manhattan, is seeking an end to Wolfgang's Vault's unlicensed use of the recordings and restitution for their past use, the complaint says. NMPA estimates that Wolfgang's Vault receives about 50,000 visitors per day. “Systematic copyright infringement cannot be a business model, and it is unfortunate that Wolfgang’s Vault chose not to compensate all of the creators responsible for their content,” NMPA President David Israelite said in a news release. “Hopefully, this lawsuit will bring publishers and many iconic songwriters the revenue they deserve for the use of their music.” Wolfgang's Vault didn't comment.

The FTC wants the court-appointed consumer privacy ombudsman in RadioShack’s bankruptcy case to recommend against the sale of personal customer data as a stand-alone asset, Consumer Protection Director Jessica Rich told the ombudsman, an agency news release said. RadioShack obtained personal data, including consumers’ names, addresses, email addresses and purchase histories from tens of millions of consumers, Rich said. RadioShack had extensive privacy promises it made to consumers online and in stores, including the promise to not sell consumers’ information or the company’s mailing lists, Rich said. Consumer information should be sold only to another entity that's substantially in the same line of business as RadioShack and that buyer should be bound by the RadioShack privacy policies that were in place when the consumers’ data was collected, Rich said. The buyer should also give consumers notice their data was bought and obtain affirmative consent if the data is to be used in a manner that differs from promises RadioShack made, she said. Rich pointed to FTC intervention in the bankruptcy case of the online retailer Toysmart, which sought to sell customers’ information despite promises made in its privacy policies, as an example of how conditions successfully can be put on the sale of data both to allow the company to divest assets and to protect consumers’ information, the release said. RadioShack’s privacy policy had said (see 1504020032) that “we will not sell or rent your personally identifiable information to anyone at any time.”

The world’s largest suppliers of lithium-ion batteries for smartphones engaged in a decade-long conspiracy through 2011 to fix prices and restrain competition, TracFone Wireless alleged in a complaint filed Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Miami. It named 17 defendants, most of them the battery and chemical subsidiaries, but not the CE operations, of Hitachi, LG, NEC, Panasonic, Samsung, Sony and Toshiba, whose “unlawful conduct is a textbook price-fixing cartel,” the complaint alleged. They represent “a small, concentrated group” of manufacturers “producing commoditized products” that sought to “artificially increase prices by agreeing to restrain competition among themselves,” it alleged. They fixed prices “through several means,” including restricting output and supply, agreeing on prices or price targets and “using common formulas tied to material costs to set industry prices, and price-floors,” it said. “While the manner, means, and impact varied over time, the cartel’s common goal during the conspiracy was to artificially raise the prices of Lithium Ion Batteries above the competitive level.” The conspiracy was “successful, to the detriment of TracFone,” it alleged. As a result of the unlawful conduct, TracFone paid “inflated prices” for lithium-ion batteries during the decade-long period, “and has suffered antitrust injury to its business or property,” it alleged. Representatives of the companies named as defendants in the complaint didn’t comment.