AirTight Networks Scores Resounding Victory in Patent Interference Provoked by AirDefense

Three Judge Panel Ends Interference Action Against AirTight’s Broad WIPS Patent

Mountain View, CA - November 7, 2007 - The USPTO (Patent and Trademark Office) Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences (BPAI) today ruled in favor of AirTight^® Networks and its U.S. Patent No. 7,002,943 in an interference action provoked by competitor, AirDefense. AirDefense provoked the interference by adding new claims to one of its pending patent applications. While AirDefense designed the new claims to look similar to AirTight’s already-issued patent claims, the BPAI specifically found AirDefense’s application lacked written support for its claims, and therefore "has no standing to challenge the patentability" of AirTight’s patent claims. The BPAI entered judgment against AirDefense and in favor of AirTight.
 
"It is apparent that AirDefense read our patent and wrote claims to read similarly to our invention in an apparent attempt to gain control of it. The court however found that there is no support for the rewritten claims in AirDefense’s patent application which shows that AirDefense was not in possession of the invention recited by the rewritten claims when they filed their patent application and hence AirDefense cannot obtain a patent with those re-written claims,” said Dr. Hemant Chaskar, Director Technology for AirTight. “We are pleased the PTO agreed with us that AirTight is the rightful owner of the coveted broad patent covering WIPS technology which was the subject of the interference, and which is an important aspect of effective WIPS protection."
 
"It is apparent to us that AirDefense recognized the value of AirTight’s unique and valuable patented technology and sought to obtain control of it through this interference action. In the end the USPTO awarded AirTight a resounding victory in this action. This ruling by the USPTO for our seminal patent granted to AirTight in 2006 re-affirms AirTight’s leadership position as the first company to invent, deliver and patent a truly effective WIPS solution,” said Pravin Bhagwat, CTO of AirTight Networks. “It was our contention all along that the claims made by our competitor would be proven false and without merit."
 
AirDefense had initiated the interference contending its employees invented the subject matter of the ‘943 patent. Under the ruling, the BPAI completely rejected that contention, and held that AirTight retains all the Intellectual Property covered under the ‘943 patent, which is directed to a “method and system for monitoring a selected region of an airspace associated with local area networks of computing devices,” and which covers key technologies that are core elements of wireless intrusion prevention systems (WIPS).
 

AirTight Networks’ SpectraGuard® Enterprise has established its industry leadership position by delivering the key elements of an effective wireless intrusion prevention system (WIPS):

• detecting and correctly classifying wireless threats - to catch all threats, while minimizing false alarms
• preventing (multiple, simultaneous) wireless threats - while continuing to scan for new ones
• accurately locating the wireless threats on a floor map - so they can be removed.

 
The AirTight patent covers technologies useful for implementing these functionalities, which are fundamental to wireless intrusion prevention. In testing by the Tolly Group, AirTight’s SpectraGuard Enterprise outperformed its competitors by a large margin in wireless intrusion prevention functionality.
 
Complementary to SpectraGuard Enterprise, AirTight has range of products - SpectraGuard Sentry, SpectraGuard Planner, and SpectraGuard SAFE (Security Agent For Endpoints) which also are technology leaders in their respective application areas. 

About AirTight Networks
AirTight Networks is a global provider of secure Wi-Fi solutions that combine its patented and industry-leading wireless intrusion prevention system (WIPS) technology with the next generation cloud-managed, controller-less Wi-Fi architecture. This unified approach allows enterprises for the first time to benefit from Wi-Fi access while concurrently protecting their networks 24/7 from wireless threats at no additional cost. AirTight's customers include global enterprises across virtually all industries and range from those who overlay AirTight WIPS^TM on top of other WLAN solutions, to those who leverage the AirTight Cloud Services^TM to rollout and manage AirTight Wi-Fi^TM, WIPS, and regulatory compliance (e.g., PCI) across tens of thousands of locations from a single console. AirTight owns the seminal patents for wireless intrusion prevention technology with 29 U.S. and international patents granted, and more than 20 additional patents pending. For more information, please visit: www.airtightnetworks.com.

Media Contacts:
Della Lowe
AirTight Networks
Tel: +1 (650) 934 8191
della.lowe@airtightnetworks.com