Facebook Inc (FB) Acquiring Patents To Expand Its Offerings

Updated on

Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB) is not behind Google when it comes to innovation. The social networking site acquired atleast 100 patents from other companies on Virtual reality, video, peer to peer printing and speech translation.

Facebook (FB) acquiring patents

According to a report from Envision IP, a New York-based research firm specializing in intellectual property, the social networking site has purchased various patents since January 2013. Maulin Shah, founder and managing director of Envision IP said that these purchases might give an idea on the future product pipeline of Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB) including possibilities such as “digital printing services to interactive wearable devices.”

Fujifilm sold the highest number of patents to Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB) totalling to 54. Patents of Fujifilm are usually in the area of image playback, image editing and presentation along with a point of sale terminal for printing images.

Patents from AT&T count to 22, which relates to personalized content delivery to analyze the relationship within the network. Apart from these two companies, Facebook also acquired 10 patent from Vega Vista related to head and motion tracking technologies and virtual displays. Inventor Neeraj Jhanji sold total of six patents related to mobile check-in to Facebook.

[drizzle]

According to Envision IP, Facebook Inc’s own engineering team is also actively getting patented their own innovation. The data suggests that the company submitted total of 69 patents in 2009, and in 2012, the number of submissions rose to 649.

Real intentions unknown

From the legal point of view, the company is playing safe by acquiring 100% rights in areas of interest. Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB) might have some over the top ideas in speech translation and facial recognition arena, or at least the patent acquisition indicates so, says a report from Forbes. For instance, Facebook shelled $2 billion to buy Oculus rift, a start-up offering virtual reality games. There is a lot of speculation over the company’s next big step, and purchase of patents fans this speculation even more.

Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB) is not only receiving competitive headwinds from the social networking sites, but also from some of the biggest tech giants such as Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL). According to the market watchers, the new feature in the upcoming iPhone 6 might pose some threat for Facebook. The mobile payment patent filed by Apple could be a reason to worry for Facebook as CEO Zuckerberg mentioned during the latest earning call that the mobile payment will become more significant part of the platform in the coming days.

Make sure you sign up for our free newsletter

[/drizzle]

Leave a Comment