IBKR - Court ordered identification to Trading Technologies

M

mahatma76

Anybody receive this on Friday?

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Dear X:

I write to you because you are a valued customer of Interactive Brokers LLC (“IBKR”) and/or a user on the account of a valued IBKR customer, and specifically because we understand that you may have used IBKR’s BookTrader module within IBKR’s Trader Workstation and Web Trader software.

IBKR is currently engaged in the following litigation with Trading Technologies International, Inc. (“TT”): Trading Technologies International, Inc. v. IBG LLC, et al., N.D. Ill. Case No. 10 C 715 (the “TT Litigation”). TT sued IBKR for patent infringement and specifically with respect to the BookTrader module. IBKR maintains that TT’s patents are invalid and no version of Book Trader infringes TT’s patents. However, as a part of TT’s lawsuit, IBKR is legally obligated to disclose certain information to TT regarding its products accused of infringement, and must further cooperate with the Court’s orders.

While TT has not named you as a party to the TT Litigation, TT has requested and the Court has recently ordered that IBKR identify the user and user contact information (“User Information”) for certain orders or trades placed through BookTrader to TT. TT asserts that it seeks to determine how and to what extent certain customers use IBKR’s BookTrader module TT has accused of infringing its patents. Accordingly, IBKR hereby provides notice to you regarding TT’s requests and the Court’s order in order to allow you to take any necessary steps in light of IBKR’s mandated disclosure of User Information.

Should TT reach out to you, please do not hesitate to contact me directly. In addition, should TT seek to take your deposition in this TT Litigation, please contact me and let me know.
 
d08 said:
Didn't know Trading Technologies are a bunch of patent trolls.
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Well, why would you file for and receive a patent if you did not want to protect that which you are patenting? If they want to file grievance, then go for it. It's up to the courts now.
 
Overnight said:
Well, why would you file for and receive a patent if you did not want to protect that which you are patenting? If they want to file grievance, then go for it. It's up to the courts now.
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They've been going after anyone and all for prior art and what is common sense logic to many. I think they tried patent a bid/ask spread or something silly like that as well. No sympathy for them here. https://financefeeds.com/beware-patent-trolls-swamping-fx-industry-financefeeds-investigation/
 
eastern_warrior said:
They've been going after anyone and all for prior art and what is common sense logic to many. I think they tried patent a bid/ask spread or something silly like that as well. No sympathy for them here. https://financefeeds.com/beware-patent-trolls-swamping-fx-industry-financefeeds-investigation/
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Another FX technology vendor explained “My experience of IP trolls was in the context of the US. The primary issue is that in the USA it is risk free to claim patent infringment because the burden of proof is with the defendant, and the defendant cannot claim costs, even if it is a spurious claim. It is only when it goes to court that the troll is at risk of incurring meaningful costs.”

Who thought of these rules? It's insane.
 
TT has made this claim for many, many years. They have been in litigation with many platforms to enforce the patent looking for a fee of some kind. To my knowledge, it has never gone to trial. When Silexx was sued, they dropped the book trader module. CTS T4 pays a per-transaction fee to TT to use it. I hope it goes to trial but I expect it will get settled. IB wants to use it and TT never wants an adverse ruling as then all the other platforms would have cause to change their deal.
 
I've sent orders with BookTrader. But I did not receive that notice.

It would be very disturbing to find out if those "affected" traders could somehow later be "named" as a party to the litigation! That is quite insane that some patent-troll could somehow potentially affect hundreds of thousands of traders!

I could see a situation where IB tacks on a separate fee for orders placed via BookTrader! They like to pass through charges a-la-carte to their customers.
 
Ryan81 said:
I've sent orders with BookTrader. But I did not receive that notice.

It would be very disturbing to find out if those "affected" traders could somehow later be "named" as a party to the litigation! That is quite insane that some patent-troll could somehow potentially affect hundreds of thousands of traders!

I could see a situation where IB tacks on a separate fee for orders placed via BookTrader! They like to pass through charges a-la-carte to their customers.
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I was told that T4 is charged $0.02/fill that they build into their pricing structure but have to add on if your volume exceeds 20,000 contracts per month. Some platforms just pay TT a fixed charge. I do not see how the client can be named in any litigation.
 
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