IBM Denies Amazon Patent Claims, Says '80s Online Service Prodigy Blazed Trail For E-CommerceIBM Denies Amazon Patent Claims, Says '80s Online Service Prodigy Blazed Trail For E-Commerce

IBM formally denied counterclaims by Amazon.com that some of its software products and Web services violate patents held by the online book and electronics retailer.

Amazon's allegations "are a transparent effort to detract attention from its own willful infringement of IBM's intellectual property," IBM said in a document filed Monday in the U.S. District Court for Eastern Texas.

IBM originally sued Amazon in October, claiming Amazon's online customer recommendation system, as well as several other features on its popular Web site, violate IBM patents governing a broad swath of e-commerce techniques. In response, Amazon in December filed a series of counterclaims, charging that several key IBM products -- including WebSphere middleware -- violate Amazon patents.

In Monday's court filing, IBM asserted that it originated many of the e-commerce methods and tools in question in the case when it helped Sears and CBS establish the Prodigy online service in the mid-1980s. "Like services provided by today's world wide web, but before the world wide web existed, Prodigy offered news, weather, sports, shopping, banking, airline reservations, and online research," IBM noted.

"Years before [Amazon founder Jeff] Bezos entered his 'Seattle, Washington garage,' IBM, through its Prodigy joint venture, was providing subscribers with online shopping opportunities," IBM continued.

IBM also asserted that Amazon never once mentioned the patents it's now accusing IBM of violating in the four years of talks between the two companies that preceded the lawsuits. "Why? Amazon never identified the patents because IBM did not and does not infringe the patents," IBM claimed.

IBM was responding to counterclaims by Amazon that IBM's Websphere and other middleware products infringe on intellectual property rights granted to Amazon by patents that govern "a system and method for refining search queries" and a "method and apparatus for structuring the querying and interpretation of semistructured information." Amazon also counterclaimed that IBM customers that use WebSphere are violating its patent rights. WebSphere is used by thousands of businesses in the United States and throughout the world and accounts for a significant portion of IBM's revenue.