In federal court Nintendo was found guilty of infringing on the patent of japanese company Tomita Technology.  Apparently Tomita had a patent on the glasses free 3D that Nintendo uses on their 3DS.  Who is Tomita Technology you ask?  Well, I certainly had no idea and a trip to their website shows that they are apparently some kind of agricultural company.

Why an agricultural company has a patent on glasses free 3D I don’t know.  Sounds like the classic patent troll to me.  However, a little more research seems to show that Nintendo was also sued by one Seijiro Tomita, a japanese inventor and interestingly enough, a former Sony employee all the way back in 2011.  What kind of connection he has with Tomita Technology, if any, is unclear.

Patent troll or not the results appear to be pretty devastating for Nintendo.  The judge ordered that Nintendo must pay 1.82% of the wholesale price on every single unit sold to Tomita.  It doesn’t sound like a lot at first but when you consider how well the 3DS sells and just how many of them that Nintendo moves, that really adds up.

This seems like a messy situation so let us know what you think below.  Now the idea that Nintendo developed a model of the 3DS that doesn’t have 3D is starting to make a lot more sense.