Priceline 2014 Annual Report Download - page 31

actions that diminish the value of our proprietary rights or harm our reputation. In addition, effective intellectual property protection may not be
available in every country in which our services are made available online. We may be required to expend significant time and resources to
prevent infringement or to enforce our intellectual property rights.
While we believe that our intellectual property rights, including our issued patents and pending patent applications, help to protect our
business, there can be no assurance that:
If we are not successful in protecting our intellectual property, it could have a material adverse effect on our business, brands and
results of operations.
From time to time, in the ordinary course of our business, we have been subject to, and are currently subject to, legal proceedings and
claims relating to the intellectual property rights of others, and we expect that third parties will continue to assert intellectual property claims, in
particular patent claims, against us, particularly as we expand the complexity and scope of our business. For example, in February 2015, IBM
sued us and certain of our subsidiaries asserting that we infringe certain IBM patents and claiming damages and injunctive relief. While we
believe the suit to be without merit and intend to contest it vigorously, litigation is uncertain and we may not be successful. We endeavor to
defend our intellectual property rights diligently, but intellectual property litigation is extremely expensive and time consuming, and may divert
managerial attention and resources from our business objectives. Successful infringement claims against us could result in significant monetary
liability or prevent us from operating our business, or portions of our business. In addition, resolution of claims may require us to obtain licenses
to use intellectual property rights belonging to third parties, which may be expensive to procure, or possibly to cease using those rights
altogether. Any of these events could have a material adverse effect on our business, results of operations or financial condition.
Our use of "open source" software could adversely affect our ability to protect our proprietary software and subject us to possible
litigation.
We use open source software in connection with our software development. From time to time, companies that use open source
software have faced claims challenging the use of open source software and/or compliance with open source license terms. We could be subject
to suits by parties claiming ownership of what we believe to be open source software, or claiming non-compliance with open source licensing
terms. Some open source licenses require users who distribute software containing open source to make available all or part of such software,
which in some circumstances could include valuable proprietary code of the user. While we monitor our use of open source software and try to
ensure that none is used in a manner that would require us to disclose our proprietary source code or that would otherwise breach the terms of an
open source agreement, such use could inadvertently occur, in part because open source license terms are often ambiguous. Any requirement to
disclose our proprietary source code or pay damages for breach of contract could be harmful to our business, results of operations or financial
condition, and could help our competitors develop services that are similar to or better than ours.
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• a third party will not have or obtain one or more patents that can prevent us from practicing features of our business or that will require
us to pay for a license to use those features;
•
our operations do not or will not infringe valid, enforceable patents of third parties;
•
we can successfully defend our patents against challenges by third parties;
•
pending patent applications will result in the issuance of patents;
• competitors or potential competitors will not devise new methods of competing with us that are not covered by our patents or patent
applications;
• because of variations in the application of our business model to each of our services, our patents will be effective in preventing one or
more third parties from utilizing a copycat business model to offer the same service in one or more categories;
•
new prior art will not be discovered that may diminish the value of or invalidate an issued patent; or
• legislative or judicial action will not directly or indirectly affect the scope and validity of any of our patent rights, including the ability
to obtain and enforce so called "business method patents".