The maker of Polaroid cameras is suing GoPro CEO Nicholas Woodman and his company over the design of... [+]
The company that owns the rights to make Polaroid devices sued GoPro on Tuesday, alleging that the action camera maker's new cube cameras infringe on its patents.
C&A Marketing Inc., filed its lawsuit against GoPro in a U.S. District Court in Newark and said that the San Mateo, Calif.-based camera company's new Hero4 Session Camera rips off the firm's own design for its similarly shaped Polaroid Cube camera. C&A Marketing, which owns brands like SkyMall as well as the exclusive rights to manufacture certain Polaroid cameras, also noted that it had obtained a U.S. patent for the shape and functionality of its box-like camera in May. It is suing GoPro for all profits made from the Hero4 Session and asked a judge to stop the further sale and distribution of the device.
The lawsuit is the latest hurdle for GoPro, whose stock price has been shaken up by poor sales figures and an inability to convince investors that it can innovate beyond its iconic Hero action cameras. GoPro's attempt to broaden its product offerings this year with the cube-shaped Session was met with skepticism in the market, and even CEO Nick Woodman admitted on a recent quarterly earnings call that the device's sales had been underwhelming because of competition from GoPro's other products and a poorly timed launch.
"Our business in the third quarter was clearly more difficult than anticipated,” CEO Nick Woodman said in a statement last month.
The Session has not only produced sluggish sales figures, but also a lawsuit, which sent GoPro shares down more than 2% on Tuesday to below $25.00. Since the beginning of the year, the company's shares have dropped more than 60%.
In its dispute, Ridgefield Park, N.J.-based C&A pointed out that the Session, which was launched in July of this year, is too similar in shape and design to the Polaroid Cube, which was unveiled in Jan. 2014. Both devices are cube-like with rounded corners and one side reserved for the camera lens.
When contacted, a GoPro spokesperson said that the company had been granted patents for its device in the European Union and Asia, and that it had a patent pending for the device in the U.S. He also pointed to another patent the company holds, which was filed in Jan. 2014 for a protective casing around a "square-profile camera." That patent did not describe the actual camera being made, but showed that the company was making housing for a camera with "a small form factor." As the Wall Street Journal pointed out, that patent was filed a day after C&A filed for a patent for its Cube.
"All show that we were working on the design of HERO4 Session long before a competitive product appeared in the market," said GoPro spokesperson Jeff Brown in an email.
Update on Nov. 3, 2015 at 1:30 p.m.: An earlier version of this story incorrectly stated that C&A Marketing Inc. was the owner of the Polaroid brand. In fact, C&A is a licensee of the Polaroid brand and owns exclusive rights to manufacture the Polaroid Cube.
