Continuing the legal war, Oculus VR has struck back at ZeniMax with an affirmative defence stating the lawsuit over the company’s technology is an attempt to take advantage of the Facebook-Oculus $2 billion acquisition.
In a court filing in a federal court in Dallas, the virtual reality company paints ZeniMax’s suit as opportunistic reiterating that “there is not a line of ZeniMax code or any of its technology in any Oculus VR product.”
“Until the Facebook deal, and the perceived chance for a quick payout, ZeniMax never raised any claim of infringement against Oculus VR, undoubtedly because ZeniMax never has contributed any intellectual property or technology to Oculus VR,” read the Oculus filing.
“ZeniMax had a golden opportunity to make an early investment in Oculus VR and chose to pass. The lawsuit is nothing more than ZeniMax seeking to correct for a massive missed opportunity through the assertion of meritless litigation.”
Back in May, ZeniMax and its subsidiary id Software filed a lawsuit against Oculus, not long after Facebook announced that it has acquired Oculus for $2 billion. ZeniMax claimed that founder Palmer Luckey and his company have used codes and other key advancements in virtual reality technology developed by ZeniMax spending “tens of millions of dollars.”
However, Oculus denies the claims stating “By deliberately misstating some facts and omitting others, ZeniMax makes the incredible assertion that it, a videogame software publishing company for personal computers and consoles like the Sony PlayStation, invented and developed a virtual reality hardware and software system.”
Oculus has also cited e-mail before the Rift’s demo at the E3 2012 as proof, from the Doom co-creator John Carmack (also the id Software Technical Director and ZeniMax employee at the time) to the Oculus founder Palmer Luckey:
“I warned [Luckey] ahead of time that it was a foregone conclusion that some of the media would report the Rift as my work, despite my ve[r]y explicit description otherwise.”
Oculus goes on adding that before the Facebook acquisition, ZeniMax “appeared to have lost whatever interest it had in VR,” but just after the announcement of $2 billion acquisition the company “suddenly begin asserting supposed ownership rights over Oculus VR’s technology.”
