SANTA CLARA, Calif. — Brent Townshend, the Quebec-based developer who worked on several core concepts for pulse-code modulated (PCM) modems, received several U.S. patents this week for that technology.
The Patent & Trademark Office issued Townshend patent No. 5,801,695 for PCM-based client modems. Townshend initially approached U.S. Robotics Inc. with several of his concepts for 56-kbit/second technology, and 3Com Corp. negotiated exclusive rights to the patents after acquiring U.S. Robotics.
When standards bodies began to develop the standard later known as V.90, 3Com and Townshend pledged to make patent licenses available on a fair and non-discriminatory basis. 3Com is serving as Townshend's licensing agent, and is brokering fees for the existing and pending patents from both itself and Townshend.
Neil Clemmons, vice president of marketing at 3Com, said that license fees are identical for semiconductor manufacturers and OEMs. Townshend gets $1.25 per client modem and $2.50 per server port. In addition, 3Com is setting a one-time charge of $100,000 per company (once for client implementations, once for server implementations) for its own patents.
Clemmons explained that Townshend still has a patent pending for server implementations of PCM, while 3Com has several patents pending covering various implementation details. 3Com and Townshend will not add more fees as new patents are issued, and the fees constitute rights to the full V.90 portfolio, including implementations of "combo" modems supporting both V.90 and splitterless ADSL.
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