Judge rules for RIM in patent suit

RIM said a U.S. District Court judge has ruled that the company's products do not infringe on a Glenayre patent related to battery technology, a charge Atlanta-based Glenayre made in a 1999 suit against RIM. The only remaining issue, according to RIM, is whether the judge will declare Glenayre's patent itself to be invalid.

Glenayre plans to ask the judge to let it file a request for reconsideration of the matter, the company said late Monday.

"We are confident of our position in this matter and hope the U.S. District Court will look favorably upon our request for reconsideration," Glenayre CEO Eric Doggett said in a statement.

Glenayre, which previously focused on wireless messaging, recently announced it would begin focusing its business on providing access to e-mail and voice mail over the Internet and cell phones.

Canada's RIM, which makes the BlackBerry two-way e-mail pager, filed a patent suit of its own in May of this year, charging that Glenayre violates a RIM patent over how to redirect e-mail using a single e-mail account.

Separately on Monday, RIM said Computer Associates' Unicenter software can now be used to manage a network of RIM pagers, in the same way that Unicenter helps companies manage networks of other tech products, such as computers.

"As mobile devices are becoming more prevalent in e-business, it's becoming increasingly important to manage them in a similar fashion (to) the rest of the corporate infrastructure," CA Vice President David Hochhauser said in a statement.