#patent

Last week General Motors filed an application with United States Patent & Trademark Office to register SS as a trademark ( search for 85597402 here). Though Chevrolet has used the SS designation since the early 1960s, first appearing on the ’61 Impala SS, it has apparently never before taken the steps to protect it as a trademark.

Over the last several years, Toyota has fought off suits by a firm called Paice, which claimed to own patents on technology used in Toyota’s hybrid drivetrains. Toyota settled that dispute a year ago, but now Bloomberg reports that another firm is going after Toyota’s hybrid Intellectual Property (IP). According to the report

Efficient Drivetrains Inc., based in Palo Alto, California, has an exclusive license from the University of California for use of the technology, including the way electricity is drawn from a battery to power an electric motor and an internal combustion engine, according to a July 20 federal court complaint filed by Toyota in San Jose… The five patents at issue also include technology, invented by EDI co-founder Andy Frank, on ways to control the power output of an internal combustion engine and a method to draw electricity to operate the electric motor and the internal combustion engine, together or separately depending on driving conditions

You can read Toyota’s complete filing here.

Ford’s Sync doesn’t get a break. It attracted undue attention from LaHood’s distracted driving crusade. Consumer Reports had issues with the system. Sync sank Ford in the 2011 J.D. Power Initial Quality Survey. Can it get any worse?

Yes, it can. Ford is being sued for patent infringement.