Destiny Media Technologies (OTC BB: DSNY.OB) issued two press releases within the last several hours.
The first relates to the company's dispute with Yangaroo (TSX Venture: YOO.V), "Destiny Media Responds to Press Release From Canadian Competitor". Excerpt:
VANCOUVER, British Columbia, May 6 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Destiny Media Technologies, Inc. (OTC Bulletin Board: DSNY - News), the industry's leading secure digital media distribution company, is pleased to respond to a press release issued this afternoon by Yangaroo Inc. (TSX: YOO, Pink Sheets: YOOIF). Yangaroo offers a web based product that competes with Destiny's Play MPE® system in Canada.
According to their release, Yangaroo states that a claim for patent infringement against Destiny was filed in Wisconsin today for a patent issued yesterday. Destiny has not yet been served with this claim but is familiar with this patent and Destiny's management is confident that the claims are without merit. Destiny previously filed a $25 million slander and defamation suit against Yangaroo, for misleading Destiny's customers regarding the limits of Yangaroo intellectual property rights.
Destiny first began offering the MPE® system in 1999 and has its own patent for a Digital Media Distribution Method and System (USPTO 7466823) with foreign priority dating to March 2000. Yangaroo applied for their US patent May 8th 2003, four years after MPE® launched. Yangaroo listed Destiny's MPE® patent as prior art in their own application, clearly admitting that the MPE® system predated their application.
Yangaroo's original patent application was unsuccessful and they received a final rejection on December 15, 2008, forcing them to abandon all 109 of their original claims. They wrote and submitted a new single claim in January 2009 and this single claim patent was granted yesterday. Their new claim describes a method of distributing music that takes a different approach than that used by MPE®.
According to Destiny CEO, Steve Vestergaard, the suit is frivolous and only intended to create confusion in the marketplace. "They say imitation is the best form of flattery, but intellectual property law protects the invention that comes first, so their claims that we might infringe on a claim they only wrote a few months ago are ridiculous. Play MPE® is well on the way to becoming the global standard as over one thousand labels, including all the majors have chosen our system to send their new music to radio and we will protect our customer's ability to use the system they prefer."
The second press release announces a new deal in Australia, "Destiny Media Announces Partnership Between Play MPE(R) and Australian Independent Record Labels Association". Excerpt:
VANCOUVER, British Columbia, May 7 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Destiny Media Technologies, Inc. (OTC Bulletin Board: DSNY - News), the industry's leading secure digital media distribution company, is pleased to announce that Australian partner, The Shooting Star Picture Company has established a partnership with the Australian Independent Record Labels Association (AIR) to provide media distribution services for Australia's 300+ indie record companies through the Play MPE® music delivery software.
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5 comments:
Dave, how much more money are you willing to throw after these illiquid penny stocks? None of these issues even merit a second look. Look at big caps name like I have been looking - that's where the value is. HEMGF, PNWIF, DSNY, ALLOY STEEL - they all suck.
No one is taking the bait? Dave, speak up!
Another press release from DSNY: "Universal Music to Expand Usage of Play MPE(R) Secure Digital Media Distribution System to 77 Countries"
That last press release about Universal International prompted Aaron Edelheit to comment on his DSNY thread on the VIC for the first time in 7 months:
"DSNY just announced they won the contract for Universal International, which is separate from Universal NA. Universal Int'l is twice the size of Universal NA. This makes the company solidly profitable. On a less negative day, this stock would be up more."
I spoke with Destiny's CFO Fred Vandenberg this evening and he supported Edeleheit's claim that Universal International is about double the size of Universal North America. He also said that he had this deal in mind when he predicted profitability to me recently, but that he thinks DSNY was on track to be profitable (albeit less so) had it not gone through.
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