Daily Real Estate News  |  August 24, 2009  |   Court Rules Against Class Action in Patent Suit
A federal district court denied class action certification last week for the plaintiff in a patent infringement lawsuit filed against the NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF REALTORSŪ, among others.

The U.S. District Court for the Central District of California ruled for the defendants on Monday, Aug. 17, denying the plaintiff's effort to bring the case as a class action. The case concerns the use of a zoom-enabled map to show the geographic location of real estate listings on multiple sites operated by Move Inc. The plaintiff, Real Estate Alliance Ltd., alleges that this usage infringes on the company’s patents.

The original case was filed in 2005 when the Real Estate Alliance brought a lawsuit against a real estate broker in Pennsylvania to enforce two patents, which expired in 2006 and 2008 respectively. It has since expanded to include the NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF REALTORSŪ, Move Inc., and the National Association of Home Builders. The current litigation focuses on the period when the patents were still in force.

-- Brian Summerfield, Online Editor