Oculus VR, the maker of the upcoming virtual reality head-mounted display called Rift, has responded to a lawsuit filed by ZeniMax and claims that the lawsuit is a "meritless litigation."
On May 21, ZeniMax filed a lawsuit against Oculus VR claiming that the company and its founder Palmer Luckey, had illegally misappropriated ZeniMax' trade secrets linked to virtual reality technology. The ZeniMax lawsuit also holds Oculus VR responsible for infringing its trademarks and copyrights.
"Intellectual property forms the foundation of our business," says Robert Altman, Chairman and CEO of ZeniMax. "We cannot ignore the unlawful exploitation of intellectual property that we develop and own, nor will we allow misappropriation and infringement to go unaddressed."
In response to the lawsuit, Oculus VR has filed an official response, which says that ZeniMax is falsely claiming ownership of Oculus VR technology. The response also says that it is clear that ZeniMax is attempting to take advantage of the recently announced acquisition of Oculus VR by social media website Facebook.
The official statement suggests that ZeniMax had access to the Oculus source code years before the Facebook deal materialized. Oculus VR's response also highlights that ZeniMax did not lodge any complaint at that time. However, ZeniMax is now trying to cash out with the latest $2 billion acquisition of Oculus VR by Facebook.
"ZeniMax had a golden opportunity to make an early investment in Oculus VR and chose to pass. The lawsuit is nothing more than ZeniMax seeking to correct for a massive missed opportunity through the assertion of meritless litigation," per [pdf] the Oculus VR response to Zenimax's lawsuit.
The Oculus VR response also refers to its Chief Technology Officer (CTO), John Carmack, formerly employed by ZeniMax. Oculus VR has repeatedly indicated that Carmarck was not responsible for any coding or hardware in its upcoming Rift VR system, while employed by ZeniMax. The filed response gives full credit for the advancements in virtual reality technology. Luckey is believed to have turned his inventions in the form of Rift so that other people can also take advantage of the technology.
"Luckey created many working virtual reality (VR) head-mounted displays (HMDs), incorporated a number of different motion sensors into those HMDs, shared his work publicly, and displayed those HMDs live on numerous occasions - all before having any interaction or communication with ZeniMax," reads the Oculus VR response.
The court date for the hearing has not been set. However, Oculus requests a jury trial pertaining to the matters linked to the case.
