Unix System Laboratories, Inc. v. Berkeley Software Design, Inc.

832 F. Supp. 790, 29 U.S.P.Q. 2d (BNA) 1561, 1993 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 12964, 1993 WL 365644
CourtDistrict Court, D. New Jersey
DecidedSeptember 8, 1993
DocketCiv. 92-1667
StatusPublished
Cited by10 cases

This text of 832 F. Supp. 790 (Unix System Laboratories, Inc. v. Berkeley Software Design, Inc.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, D. New Jersey primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Unix System Laboratories, Inc. v. Berkeley Software Design, Inc., 832 F. Supp. 790, 29 U.S.P.Q. 2d (BNA) 1561, 1993 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 12964, 1993 WL 365644 (D.N.J. 1993).

Opinion

OPINION

DEBEVOISE, District Judge.

Plaintiff Unix System Laboratories, Inc. (“USL”) instituted this action seeking relief from Defendants’ past and prospective distribution of computer software in alleged violation of Plaintiffs proprietary rights in the UNIX operating system. Defendants now move to dismiss all of Plaintiffs claims against the Regents in their individual and official capacities (“the Regents”), and four of Plaintiffs five claims against the Regents in their corporate capacity as the Board of Regents of the University of California (“the University”). 1 For the reasons given below, Defendants’ motions are granted in part and denied in part.

I. STATEMENT OF FACTS

Plaintiff Unix System Laboratories (“USL”) is a Delaware corporation with its principal place of business in Summit, New Jersey. Plaintiff develops, manufactures, licenses, and sells computer operating systems and related products and services. Plaintiff is also the present assignee of AT & T’s rights to UNIX, the computer software at the heart of this dispute. Defendant Berkeley Software Designs, Inc. (“BSDI”) is a recently-formed Delaware corporation with its principal place of business in Richmond Falls, Virginia. BSDI intends to develop, manufacture, and sell computer operating systems like those of Plaintiff. Defendant officials are members of the Board of Regents (the “Regents”) of the University. The Regents are a non-profit public corporation organized to administer the University pursuant to the California constitution, art. 9 § 9, and California state law.

A. Background

The central issue in the case as a whole is whether Defendants appropriated pieces of Plaintiffs allegedly proprietary program “UNIX,” and then used and distributed these pieces without authorization in violation of Plaintiffs copyrights and trade secrets. UNIX is a computer operating system — a software program that oversees a computer’s internal and external activities, including processing, resource allocation, communications, and applications use. AT & T’s Bell Laboratories registered the name UNIX as Trademark No. 1,392,203 on May 6, 1986. (1st Am.Compl. Ex. B.) In addition, AT & T has received copyright certificates of registration on various versions of UNIX software and documentation. {Id., Exs. C-F.)

Before exploring the details of Plaintiffs allegations, it is important to step back and appreciate the importance of UNIX in the world of computing. All parties agree that UNIX is one of the most highly-regarded operating systems in the world. Numerous treatises, courses, graduate student theses, and research projects have investigated, expounded, and improved upon UNIX. In addition, programmers at Microsoft, Sun Microsystems, Digital, IBM, and elsewhere have all developed their own UNIX-like, *794 UNIX-compatible operating systems (some under license by Plaintiff). (Carson Reply Aff. at ¶¶ 11-12.)

AT & T developed UNIX in the late 1960s and early 1970s, and then quickly began licensing UNIX to educational, government, and commercial users, including the University of California at Berkeley (“Berkeley”). Berkeley and AT & T apparently collaborated on UNIX’s development at least in the early years, with AT & T personnel often visiting Berkeley for consultations. The parties executed their first UNIX licensing agreement in 1973, and by 1979 the parties had executed then’ first agreement covering the software that Plaintiff now seeks to protect, UNIX version 32V. The 32V agreement permits the Regents to create derivatives of UNIX and, to the extent that the derivatives are free of proprietary information, to distribute them without restriction.

Berkeley exercised its contractual right to derivatize 32V to the hilt. It began to create its own embellishments and additions, called Berkeley Software Distributions (“BSD”) releases, and distributed them via the Regents’ Computer Sciences Research Group (“CSRG”). In the early 1980s, Berkeley only distributed the releases to other licensees (which now number in the thousands) because the releases contained proprietary code governed by Berkeley’s license with AT & T. But demand for the releases from unlicensed users grew, so Berkeley began distributing redacted releases with the proprietary material allegedly removed. These releases included the operating system at the heart of the present dispute, Net2, which Plaintiff has alleged violates its proprietary rights in 32V.

Net2 apparently began as a project to develop a UNIX-like product devoid of AT & T proprietary code. This product was to contain both non-proprietary software from the BSD releases and software written specifically for Net2, sometimes by volunteers. (Kennedy Aff., Ex. 6.) To guarantee that no proprietary code remained, CSRG screened and eliminated overlapping code sections in accordance with criteria developed together with Berkeley’s legal counsel. In addition, Berkeley “repeatedly contacted the USL licensing office, in an attempt to have them review software we intended to distribute.” (McKusick Deck at 8.) Plaintiff allegedly refused to cooperate, although it had performed similar services for others.

Berkeley’s decision to excise AT & T’s code was motivated by several related concerns. First, the University of California received substantial benefits by being the center of UNIX software development, benefits that would increase if it could expand the family of UNIX users by extending UNIX to non-licensees (Ibid.); second, the cost of an AT & T UNIX license had increased to around $200,000, excluding all but the largest users (Ibid.); third, the Net2 version of UNIX would offer new and improved services (Keith Bostic, Marshall K. McKusick, & Michael J. Karels, Berkeley UNIX Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow, in Kennedy Aff. Ex. 8); and finally, the CSRG programmers, at least those who founded BSDI (Karels, McKusick, and Bostic), presumably saw in Net2 an opportunity to profit from the widespread interest in UNIX-like systems.

The end result of Berkeley’s efforts was a product that, by all accounts, contains a very small proportion of 32V code. But this is not to say that Net2 fails to display its 32V roots. Plaintiff hired Professor John Carson to unearth these roots and, after over 400 hours of digging, Professor Carson has now identified a number of instances where 32V code is embedded in the Net2 system. (Carson Aff. at ¶ 13.) The legal significance of this code is, of course, the central issue in the present dispute.

Berkeley began licensing and distributing Net2 in June 1991. Plaintiff has alleged that the “highest levels,” meaning persons reporting dirqctly to the Regents, approved Net2’s release. (E.g. Proposed 2d Am.Compl. at ¶¶ 2, 9, 38, 64, 72, 89, 103.) Indeed, Plaintiff has alleged that the University Chancellor himself approved Net2’s release. (Kennedy Aff. ¶ 16.)

An early Net2 licensee was UUNET, an electronic information exchange for people interested in UNIX. (Adams Dep. at 149, Kennedy Aff. Ex. 12.) UUNET added Net2 to its standard archives, enabling any subscriber to UUNET to freely and anonymous *795 ly copy Net2 to their own computer system.

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832 F. Supp. 790, 29 U.S.P.Q. 2d (BNA) 1561, 1993 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 12964, 1993 WL 365644, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/unix-system-laboratories-inc-v-berkeley-software-design-inc-njd-1993.