Free for a Fee

The legal and political blowback since then have made MPHJ truly unique in the patent-licensing world. The sheer mass of the company’s demand letters caused it to get sued by attorneys general in Vermont and Nebraska, making it the only patent troll to ever be sued by the government. The company’s tactics were denounced in Congress, and it drew the attention of the Federal Trade Commission.

In January, MPHJ took the stunning step of actually suing the FTC. According to MPHJ’s complaint, the FTC had threatened to file suit, saying that its letter campaign constituted a deceptive trade practice. That was a violation of its right to talk about and enforce its patents, a right protected under the First Amendment.