SAN RAFAEL, Calif. & PHOENIX — (BUSINESS WIRE) — April 9, 2010 — Autodesk, Inc. (NASDAQ: ADSK), and the Open Design Alliance (ODA) announced an agreement to settle pending disputes related to Autodesk’s DWG Trademark. Autodesk initiated proceedings with the United States Patent and Trademark Office, Trademark Trial and Appeal Board (TTAB) in 2007 to cancel the ODA’s DWG-based trademark registrations to avoid confusion with Autodesk’s established DWG brand and trademark. The ODA has agreed to cancel its DWG-based trademark registrations and cease use of DWG and DWG-based trademarks in its product marketing and branding, and Autodesk has agreed to withdraw the cancellation proceedings with the TTAB. The settlement does not preclude ODA from developing interoperable software or from using the .dwg extension in its file names. Terms and conditions of the settlement agreement are confidential.
“We are pleased to have reached this agreement with the ODA so we can move beyond our DWG trademark disputes,” said Amar Hanspal, Senior Vice President, Autodesk Platform Solutions and Emerging Businesses. “This settlement is reflective of both parties’ continuing focus on interoperability for 2D and 3D design, engineering and entertainment software users.”
Arnold van der Weide, President of the ODA stated, “The ODA is pleased that we are able to reach this settlement with Autodesk and turn our focus from the legal arena to the development of our TEIGHA software development platform which, among other things, is designed to work with Autodesk’s DWG file format.”
DWG is the name of Autodesk’s proprietary file format and technology used in AutoCAD software and other products, including the recently released AutoCAD 2011 and RealDWG 2011, and is an Autodesk trademark. Autodesk does not prevent others from either using .dwg as a file extension or from making software that is compatible with the Autodesk DWG file format. However, certain uses of DWG as a trademark are not permissible, so this settlement focuses on avoiding customer confusion by non-Autodesk products’ use of DWG as a trademark without prior permission from Autodesk.
About Autodesk
Autodesk, Inc., is a world leader in 2D and 3D design, engineering and entertainment software for the manufacturing, building and construction, and media and entertainment markets. Since its introduction of AutoCAD software in 1982, Autodesk continues to develop the broadest portfolio of state-of-the-art software to help customers experience their ideas digitally before they are built. Fortune 100 companies — as well as the last 14 Academy Award winners for Best Visual Effects — use Autodesk software tools to design, visualize and simulate their ideas to save time and money, enhance quality, and foster innovation for competitive advantage. For additional information about Autodesk, visit www.autodesk.com.
About ODA
The Open Design Alliance is a non-profit consortium of over 2,000 software developers and users in 40 countries committed to promoting open, industry-standard formats for the exchange of CAD data and CAD legacy data. Teigha™, the software development platform, provides software developers with the tools to create a wide range of technical graphics applications, including custom data access and editing utilities, visualization tools, and even full-scale CAD systems. Teigha also supports the use of both .dwg and .dgn files, with import and export capabilities to other file formats. The Open Design Alliance maintains and publishes the Open Design Specification for .dwg files. For additional information about the ODA, visit www.opendesign.com.
Autodesk, AutoCAD, DWG and RealDWG are registered trademarks or trademarks of Autodesk, Inc., and/or its subsidiaries and/or affiliates in the USA and/or other countries. Open Design Alliance and Teigha are registered trademarks or trademarks of the Open Design Alliance. Academy Award is a registered trademark of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. All other brand names, product names or trademarks belong to their respective holders. Autodesk reserves the right to alter product and services offerings, and specifications and pricing at any time without notice, and is not responsible for typographical or graphical errors that may appear in this document.
© 2010 Autodesk, Inc. All rights reserved.
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