Verizon, Google, Uber, Others Make $3M Defensive Patent Buy (1)

A coalition of companies, including Verizon Communications Inc., Alphabet Inc.'s Google and Uber Technologies Inc., has collectively spent $3 million to buy batches of tech patents to protect against infringement lawsuits, a patent sale group said.

The nonprofit Allied Security Trust announced Jan. 23 that it sold 49 patents and 6 patent applications in 2018 through its Industry Patent Purchase Program (IP3). Three dozen companies are members of the trust, and 19 participated in the program. Honda Motor Co. Ltd., IBM Corp., Intel Corp., Microsoft Corp., Oracle Corp., and Royal Philips NV are among the companies in the purchasing coalition ...