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January 24, 2002
Qualcomm Inc. has signed royalty-bearing, commercial CDMA subscriber unit and infrastructure license agreements with 11 additional Chinese telecommunications equipment manufacturers, making a total of 17 domestic Chinese telecommunications equipment manufacturers that are now licensed by Qualcomm.
Under the terms of the worldwide royalty-bearing license agreements, Qualcomm has granted these Chinese manufacturers licenses under Qualcomm's CDMA patent portfolio to develop, manufacture and sell cdmaOne and third-generation CDMA2000 1X/1xEV-DO subscriber unit and/or infrastructure equipment.
The new Chinese subscriber unit licensees are Beijing Telecommunications Equipment Factory (Capital Group); CEC Telecom; Dalian Daxian Group Co. Ltd.; Datang Telecom Technology Co. Ltd.; Eastern Communications Co. Ltd.; Guangzhou Southern Hi-Tech Co. Ltd.; Konka Group Co. Ltd.; Langchao Electronic Information Industry Group; Ningbo Bird Co. Ltd.; and Xiamen Overseas Chinese Electronic Co. Ltd.
The Infrastructure licensees are Beijing Telecommunications Equipment Factory; Guangzhou Jinpeng Group Co. Ltd.; and Datang Telecom Technology Co. Ltd.
"With China Unicom's recent launch of CDMA nationwide services in China, these manufacturers are well-positioned to significantly contribute to the growth of the Chinese and worldwide CDMA markets," says Steve Altman, president of Qualcomm Technology Licensing. "The signing of commercial license agreements with Chinese domestic manufacturers will help build a strong CDMA manufacturing base in China. We look forward to working closely with each of these manufacturers to facilitate their rapid introduction of high-quality, high-speed and cost-effective CDMA products."
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Southern California home prices ended the year at a new peak, the result of tight inventory and reasonable mortgage rates. Sales counts were slightly behind year-ago levels as stretched-out escrows put some closings off for a few weeks, a real estate information service reported.
A total of 24,913 new and resale houses and condos were sold in Los Angeles, Riverside, San Diego, Ventura, San Bernardino and Orange counties last month. That was up 9.3 percent from 22,795 for the month before, and down 1.6 percent from 25,323 for December last year, reports San Diego-based DataQuick Information Systems.
In San Diego, 4,093 homes sold in December 2001. That is down 4.4 percent from 4,278 sold the previous year.
"A surge of refinance activity strained industry resources in December and probably nudged quite a few December sales into January," says Mike Ela, DataQuick president. "While a lot of the purchasing activity has been in entry-level markets the last few months, it appears that many move-up buyers got back into the market toward the end of the year. Many of those were buyers who had put their plans on hold after 911. Their activity, along with the regular year-end surge of new home sales, pushed December's median to a new peak in all Southland counties."
The number of newly-built homes sold was 5,053 in December, the highest since 5,482 were sold in December 1989.
The median price paid for a Southern California home was $247,000 last month. That was up 3.8 percent from $238,000 for November, and up 12.3 percent from $220,000 for December last year. That year-over- year increase was the strongest since July 1989 when prices rose 14.7 percent to $179,000 from $156,000 a year earlier.
In San Diego, the median price for a home last month was $286,000, up 10 percent from $259,000 the year before.
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Callaway Golf Co. reports that its intellectual property enforcement efforts in 2001 included, among other actions, two criminal cases filed to stop the theft of Callaway Golf products and components.
These actions were a part of Callaway Golf's worldwide effort to stop illegal copying, counterfeiting, or diversion of its products.
In one criminal case, Callaway worked with the Orange County Sheriff's Department to arrest five people charged with the theft and resale of Callaway Golf product destined for customers.
The activity was first discovered by Callaway Golf's Internet monitoring efforts. Callaway Golf's security department worked with the Sheriff's Department and others and provided some leads as to where the thefts might be occurring.
On Dec. 24, deputies executed four search warrants and made the arrests. At the same time, they seized about $50,000 of allegedly stolen goods.
In a second criminal case, Callaway assisted the El Cajon Police Department in the arrest of a man charged with bringing stolen Callaway Golf club components into the United States. On Jan. 3, El Cajon Police arrested the suspect and seized components then in his possession valued at almost $6,000. Based upon information developed by Callaway Golf, it appears that the diverted products could have been destined for places as far away as New Zealand.
In May, Callaway Golf provided information to the U.S. Attorneys' Office in Houston, Texas, and the U.S. Customs Service in support of the conviction and sentencing of the owner of Beta Golf for smuggling infringing golf clubs. The owner was sentenced to six months home detention, five years probation, a $10,000 fine, ordered to liquidate offending inventory, and barred from participating in the golf industry in the future.
In a civil case concluded in March, a federal judge in the Central District of California entered judgment against Trophy Sports LLC and its principals Ren Jei Liou and Jethro Liou for patent, trademark, copyright and trade dress infringement, as well as deceptive trade practices and unfair competition. The judgment also required that Trophy Sports and the Lious stop selling eight different models of infringing golf clubs, turn over infringing golf club heads for destruction, and pay $20,000 to Callaway.
Much of the company’s efforts in 2001 were focused upon Asia, where many illegal copies are manufactured.
The company’s work with U.S. Customs has been complemented by ongoing domestic enforcement of the company’s trademarks and patents and the company’s Internet monitoring program.
"We continue to seek worldwide intellectual property protection for our products, including those new products that we will be launching in Orlando this week," says Steve McCracken, senior executive v.p. and chief legal officer. "We have been especially pleased by the assistance of local and national law enforcement in our efforts, as well as the continuing efforts of foreign governments and our own U.S. Customs Service to help stop illegal copies bound for sale in the United States."
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Callaway Golf also reports that in 2001 it was granted more United States golf-related patents than any of its domestic competitors, and continues to build one of the largest golf equipment patent portfolios in the world.
In 2001, Callaway Golf filed 80 golf-related (club and ball) patent applications in the United States. Over the same period, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office granted 54 patents to Callaway Golf — a number the company believes is the largest number of golf-related U.S. patents granted to any United States manufacturer in 2001.
Based on information available from the PTO, the number of golf club patents granted to Callaway Golf in 2001 exceeded the number granted to all of its domestic golf club competitors, combined.
"Callaway Golf has a long history of innovation, and of protecting that innovation legally with patents, trademarks, and other devices," says Steve McCracken, senior executive v.p. and chief legal officer. "That innovation has allowed the company to build one of the largest golf-related patent portfolios in the world in a very short period of time. We are proud of our record in this area, and we will continue to build our portfolio of intellectual property rights as we introduce new products in 2002 and beyond."
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Mitchell International of San Diego and Fix Auto, a network of independently owned collision repair facilities with headquarters in Canada, have made an agreement under which Fix Auto has selected Mitchell’s ABS Body Shop Management System as the preferred system for all Fix USA network members.
“We, at Mitchell, are very proud that ABS has been chosen as Fix Auto’s management system,” says Paul Gange, Mitchell’s v.p. of collision sales. “We view Fix Auto as a progressive and innovative collision repair organization. Their selection of ABS is a testament to our product leadership and proven reliability.”
Erick Bickett, CEO of Fix Auto USA, says there are a lot of reasons Fix chose ABS as its preferred management system. “It’s a stable, proven product,” he says, noting that ABS is used by more shops in the collision repair industry than any other.
Forty percent of the Fix network members were already ABS users prior to the agreement, Bickett says. Since the agreement was signed, 11 more Fix Auto member shops have installed the system. Fix Auto is a growing shop network, which recently added members and now stands at 89 repair facilities
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GCS Public Relations is San Diego’s newest name in public relations.
Founded by Tom Gable, Rick Cook and Jon Schmid, GCS is staffed with a core of senior counselors, supplemented by a network of specialists and strategic partners whose expertise is applied on an as-needed basis to suit specific client requirements.
"The current economic climate requires an expanded array of communications resources to help clients break through the clutter, compete for market attention and grow market share but within tighter budget constraints for most," says Gable, chairman and CEO of GCS Public Relations. "GCS' flat organization with virtual support fits with client preferences for an agency that can successfully deliver results from the highest level of strategic planning, positioning and branding to managing the daily details of the most complex program toward measurable results."
Through its in-house staff and network of specialists and strategic partners, GCS offers a full range of marketing communications services, including media relations, investor relations, public affairs, crisis communications and issues management, community relations, international public relations, Hispanic marketing, Web site development and creative design work.
"The new model is also designed to help San Diego companies position themselves well ahead of their competitors to take full advantage of the growing economy we expect to see later this year," says Schmid, GCS partner. "We are creating integrated marketing communications programs that ramp up strategically for clients who want to favorably impact prime audiences, from the media to customers to investors. Results can come quickly and cost effectively when approached with a customized array of resources totally aligned with client needs."
GCS' roots go back more than 25 years to The Gable Group, where all three of the partners worked before forming GCS. Gable Group folded late last year.
GCS' offices are in the Golden Triangle, 5060 Shoreham Place, Ste. 200.
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Sempra Energy Resources, a unit of San Diego-based Sempra Energy, will soon complete the underground piping and foundation for a 1,250MW power plant near Arlington, Ariz.
Located on a 400-acre site, the Mesquite generating station is being built to serve the southwest power market, including utilities and other whole energy purchasers.
At an estimated $690 million project cost, the 1,250MW plant is the second largest merchant power plant under construction in the state, second only to the 2,300MW Gila River project. The plant will have a natural gas fired combined-cycle configuration consisting of two 625MW power blocks, each having two GE model PG7241FA combustion turbine generators and a single GE steam turbine generator. The first block will come online mid year 2003, with the second block scheduled to come online in the beginning of 2004.
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Cardiff Software Inc. has released a preview of its XForms Publishing Agent for LiquidOffice, becoming the first to offer graphical form design applications for the emerging XForms standard.
This announcement extends Cardiff's form design application with the ability to publish local documents, conforming to the latest XForms v1.0 specification by the World Wide Web Consortium's XForms Working Group.
The XForms format adds a third industry-standard format that LiquidOffice users will be able to use to view published forms. All forms, designed with the LiquidOffice Form Designer, will now have the ability to be previewed in HTML, Adobe PDF and XForms formats.
"It is our mission to offer our customers the freedom to choose from a variety of standards-based forms management tools," says Micah Dubinko, Cardiff's chief XML architect and an author of the XForms 1.0 specification. "Our work with the W3C, and our plans to fully support the new XForms specification, helps us to deliver platform-independent solutions for eForms management."
A download of the XForms Publishing Agent will be available at www.Cardiff.com/XForms.
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The Talega Golf Course in San Clemente has signed San Diego-based Miramar Wholesale Nurseries to provide plant materials for the structure and year round color for the course.
Miramar supplied more than 100 flats of pansies, 50 flats of ivy geranium, several 13-foot Washintonia robusta palms and 15-gallon citrus for the grand opening in November. Additional plant materials will be rotated throughout the year.
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San Diego is No. 4 on a list of “Top 10 teen wired cities in America” based on a national survey of more than 6,700 parents of teens and teens conducted by Digital Marketing Services Inc.
The results are based on the amount of time that teens, ages 12 to 17, spend online on a weekly basis and also reveals what teens do while they're online, including e-mail, homework, instant message, listen to music, research current events, play games and more.
The study revealed Pittsburgh, New York and Cleveland ahead of San Diego with Los Angeles at No. 7.
Teens, aged 12 to 17 years, living in the No. 1 teen wired city - Pittsburgh - are online an average of 15.82 hours per week and teens living in the number 10 teen wired city - Milwaukee - are online an average of 12.85 hours per week.
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Grice, Lund & Tarkington, LLP, CPAs of Encinitas and Escondido have opened an office in Mission Valley and added new Principal James C. Bonk III.
Bonk has accounting, auditing, tax and consulting experience with individuals, public and privately held businesses in many industries. He also is a certified fraud examiner.
Bonk was previously owner and president of Bonk Accountancy Corp. of San Diego. Prior to owning his own firm, he was a partner of Eisenberg & Bonk for six years and a senior manager during his 10 years with Price Waterhouse.
The San Diego office address is 591 Camino De La Reina, Ste. 1216.
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Brobeck, Phleger & Harrison has added two new attorney partners in its San Diego office.
Vicki G. Norton, a member of the Intellectual Property Group, joined Brobeck in 2000.
Eddie Rodriguez, a member of the firm's Business &Technology Group, joined Brobeck in 1996.
"We’re very proud of this newest group of partners. They well represent the diversity of the firm and its practice areas," says Brobeck Chairman Tower C. Snow, Jr. "These individuals all bring unique skill sets to the table and share a deep commitment to Brobeck's vision, values and goals."
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