Intellectual Property Summary - Concurrent Computer (CCUR)
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By: Bruce Bahlmann - Contributing Author (your feedback is important to us!)

Last Update: 01/05/2007

CCUR has 15 matters including 5 issued patents and 10 published US applications. All 5 of the issued patents are either expired or about to expire as they were filed in the mid 1980s. CCUR actually stopped filing patents between the years 1988 through 2000, however since 2001, they have averaged at least one patent per year. 

As much of the basic hardware concepts of VoD were pioneered in the early 90s by telcos like US West (which have either expired or about to expire), newer VoD patents increasingly focus on improvements in the user experience, stream management, content management, and more recently integration. With the exception of user experience, CCUR patent applications have focused around these concepts including multi-tiered asset/content management, targeting images and advertising within a VoD system, vertical integration, and asymmetric handling of VoD requests. 

Patent filings at CCUR shows two groups of inventors - those with issued patents (which were filed in the mid 1980s) and those with pending applications (within the last 6 years). There is no overlap between the two which leads us to believe there has been some turnover within the company regarding key inventors. There are also inventors in unlikely positions such as Kirk Somers who heads up Investor Relations for the company, and no inventors in areas where most companies show strategic strength - such as their current CTO. CCUR does have patents field from its former CTO Fred Allegrezza. Several of CCURs applications show either collaboration between CCUR inventors and those working for large system operators or people moving from CCUR to their customers and then back working for CCUR. This is particularly evident with PA based inventors of CCUR, specifically Michael Chen and Robert Gaydos who have contributed on patents assigned to Comcast. 

With the exception of Minerva Networks, no other competitor of CCUR has shown up with prior art during the prosecution of its pending patents. We see this as a positive sign in CCUR's patent filings. However another explanation for this could be the result of CCUR's recent technology shift to a more open platform (Linux) combined with its seeking patents in the areas of vertical integration place it on a unique path over its competitors who operate on highly proprietary platforms. 

Both CCUR and rival SeaChange have been exposed to a key VoD delivery patent from nCUBE [5805804] which was acquired by C-CORE. In March of 2002, CCUR obtained a stake in Thirdspace Living Ltd. (a brain child of larry Ellison of Oracle which is now defunct) and secured a license for Thirdspace's existing portfolio, which happened to be shared by nCUBE and include this vital patent which is currently cited by 186 other patents. This deal insulated CCUR from the legal intellectual property battles faced by SeaChange and which it claims would still be good should there be a change in control (should CCUR be sold). nCube has since won the patent fight with SeaChange paying 2 million plus 7% of revenue from 2002 on for a license to its patent.

Research Details: 

Inventors:

Patents:

[4729124] Diagnostic system [12/19/1985]
[4716525] Peripheral controller for coupling data buses having different protocol and transfer rates [12/29/1987]
[4694194] Power supply with battery backup [11/4/1985]
[4653019] High speed barrel shifter [3/24/1987]
[4636944] Multi-level priority micro-interrupt controller [1/13/1987]

Licensed Patents (via Thirdspace)

[7058721] Dynamic quality adjustment based on changing streaming constraints [8/3/1998]
[6578070] Method and apparatus for implementing seamless playback of continuous media feeds [7/13/1999]

• Cited by: Digeo, Inc, Apple

[5805804] Method and apparatus for scalable, high bandwidth storage retrieval and transportation of multimedia data on a network [3/12/1997]

• Cited by 186 other patents 

Applications:

[20060271974] Multi-tiered content management system [8/2/2006]

• No office actions yet

[20060248464] Method and system of transporting media signals and allocating assets

Comcast collaboration [4/27/2005]

• No office actions yet

[20060080167] Methods, apparatuses, and systems for presenting advertisement content within trick files [7/14/2004]

• No office actions yet

[20050081237] Method and apparatus for creating a targeted integrated image [4/16/2004]

• No office actions yet

[20050165921] Systems and methods for vertically integrated data distribution and access management [4/9/2004]

• Final rejection
• [6510556] by Kusaba of Hitachi [5/28/1998]
  • Video distributing apparatus and video distributing system
  • A system for controlling receipt and distribution of scheduled data in at least one server complex
• [20040226042] by Ellis of United Video Properties [6/9/2004]
  • Program guide system with video-on-demand browsing
  • The scheduled data represents video data
• [20050097599] by Plotnick of ? [12/14/2004]
  • Alternative advertising in prerecorded media
  • Deliver the video across the backbone and subscriber networks
• [6609149] by Bandera of IBM [4/12/1999]
  • Method and apparatus for prioritizing video frame retrieval in a shared disk cluster
  • Delivering data from first server complex to second server complex
• [20050039213] by Matarese of ? [8/11/2003]
  • Optimal provisioning and management of bandwidth in a video-on-demand services architecture
  • The resource manager requests and periodically receives information regarding resource utilization

[20040187159] Multi-tiered content management system [3/19/2003]

• Non final rejection
• [20020143791] by Levanon of ? [3/19/2001]
  • Content deployment system, method and network
  • A method of managing information related to content on a system
• [6769127] by Bonomi of Minerva Networks [6/16/2000]
  • Method and system for delivering media services and application over networks
  • Changing categorization information automatically in response to a predetermined event
• [5920700] by Gordon of Time Warner Cable [9/6/1996]
  • System for managing the addition/deletion of media assets within a network based on usage and media asset metadata

[20040267602] Method, apparatus, and system for asymmetrically handling content requests and content delivery [6/30/2003]

• Appealed
• [6219355] by Brodigan of Qwest Communications [11/30/1998]
  • Video and data communication system
  • A video communications system and method for handling content request and delivery comprising the steps of receiving at least one request for content sent upstream from at least one user over a first network
• [6757907] by Schumacher of Sprint Communications [2/9/2000]
  • Display selection in a video-on-demand system
  • Sending the request to a content library
• [20050044166] by Colville of Microsoft [8/30/2004]
  • Startup methods and apparatuses for use in streaming content
  • Buffering the retrieved content in order to allow playback to be smooth on networks that have jitter or inconsistent bandwidth response
• [5828403] by DeRodeff of US West [12/22/1995]
  • Method and system for selecting and receiving digitally transmitted signals at a plurality of television receivers
  • The first network includes an RF network
• [20030140257] by Peterka of ? [1/21/2003]
  • Encryption, authentication, and key management for multimedia content pre-encryption
  • The retrieved content received from the library is in an encrypted form, and the step of processing includes decrypting the encrypted retrieved content

[20050081241] Method, apparatus, and system for preparing images for integration and combining images into an integrated image [10/3/2003]

• No office actions yet

[20040103437] Video on demand management system [11/26/2002]

• No office actions yet

[20020157113] System and method for retrieving and storing multimedia data [4/20/2001]

• Non final rejection
• [5815146] by Youden of Hewlett-Packard [9/16/1996]
  • Video on demand system with multiple data sources configured to provide VCR-like services
  • A system and method for retrieving data distributed across a plurality of storage devices comprising a plurality of data source processors which are assigned to handle a user request by processing the requested data in data source processor
• [5892915] by Duso of EMC Corporation [5/5/1997]
  • System having client sending edit commands to server during transmission of continuous media from one clip in play list for editing the play list
  • A control server assigns a stream server to a network client requesting multimedia service in which a stream server handles client requests

Filings by Year:

1985 - 2
1986 - 0
1987 - 3
1988 - 2000 - 0
2001 - 1
2002 - 1
2003 - 3
2004 - 3
2005 - 1
2006 - 1 (so far)

Readers who use this information for investment purposes do so at their own risk! Opinions expressed are just that and not based on insider information or information otherwise obtained illegally.

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