Today Autodesk issued the following statement, in response to the AECnews report earlier today that the company has filed a federal suit against the Open Design Alliance.
Autodesk filed a legal action against the Open Design Alliance (ODA) in the United States District Court for the Western District of Washington on Monday, November 13. This action is based on trademark infringement of Autodesk’s trademark and on unfair competition by the ODA’s DWGdirect libraries. This action follows Autodesk’s attempt to resolve this matter through communications to the ODA. Autodesk contacted the Open Design Alliance (ODA) in a formal letter dated November 3, 2006 and requested that the ODA cease violating Autodesk’s rights by distribution of its new version of the DWGdirect libraries as they include technology that unlawfully imitates Autodesk’s TrustedDWG™ technology introduced in AutoCAD 2007. As of the deadline stated in Autodesk’s letter, the ODA did not respond to Autodesk’s demand that it stop violating Autodesk’s rights and confusing Autodesk’s customers by misrepresenting the source, approval or affiliation of DWG files, violating both federal and state law. Autodesk had no choice but to bring legal action to stop the violation of Autodesk’s rights and the confusion of its customers. Autodesk strongly objects to the ODA’s development and distribution of any DWGdirect library that includes the TrustedDWG technology.
Normally AECnews does not include trademark and registered trademark notation in articles, in accordance with standard journalistic practice. In this instance we left in the trademark notices, so that we would be running Autodesk’s statement exactly as it was provided.
--RSN