PokerStars takes baton from FTP in Rush Poker patent case
Operator pursuing postponement of oral proceedings ahead of decision from European Patent Office.
PokerStars’ legal team has taken over from lawyers representing Full Tilt Poker subsidiary Pocket Kings in pursuit of a patent for its fast-paced Rush Poker product.
The operator has requested a postponement of oral proceedings scheduled for October as the new legal team – tasked with pursuing the case following Stars’ takeover of Full Tilt in July – gets to grips with the matter at hand.
Matthew Dixon, a patent lawyer at Harrison Goddard Foote, the law firm representing Stars, cited the “exceptional circumstances” which may necessitate such a delay, explaining: “My client only became involved in this application seven weeks ago, having been transferred the application by court order from a non-trading company.
“Since then my client has been seeking suitable representation, as well as dealing with the ramifications of the transfer of assets. I was appointed as representative on [14 September],” he added.
A number of operators and networks have challenged the patent, with InstaDeal the first to launch a fast-paced poker offering of its own in December 2011.
InstaDeal founder Per Hildebrand told eGaming Review last year that he felt Rush Poker was “never patentable,” and has brought a number of operators onto the network in the intervening period.
Others to launch similar fast-paced games include PartyPoker, with Fast Forward, and PokerStars itself, whose Zoom product came out of beta this year.
“[The] funny part is that their lawyers once must have concluded that the product is not patentable as they launched Zoom and now want to argue that it is,” said Hildebrand.
The current date for which the oral hearing is scheduled, 22 October, may coincide in part with the relaunch of the Full Tilt brand, which Stars has said will take place on or before 6 November.