Starbucks Attacks ‘Bad Faith’ Open-Source Software Patent Threat

Starbucks Corp. accused a patent owner and its parent company of violating a state anti-“patent troll” law in a Seattle federal lawsuit that also seeks to invalidate the patents it says are being asserted against it in bad faith.

The coffee giant sued Key Patent Innovations Ltd. and its Valtrus Innovations Ltd. unit seeking declaratory judgments of noninfringement and invalidity for 11 patents in a complaint filed Thursday in the US District Court for the Western District of Washington. It also alleged violations of Washington’s Patent Troll Prevention Act and Consumer Protection Act.

Valtrus’s Feb. 4 demand letter said “all ...