Vodacom and Kenneth Makate have been duelling over the invention of the ‘Please Call Me’ service for a decade now.

It looked like they might just settle things earlier this month, but then Makate turned down what Vodacom claimed was “reasonable compensation” for his idea, and tensions escalated once more.

Makate called Vodacom’s offer “ridiculous and insulting”. It is not known what that offer was, but he had previously turned down R10 million in April of last year, saying he is entitled to a 15% share of the revenues as compensation (estimated to be up to R10,5 billion).

So, why are things not looking good for Makate? Enter Ari Kahn, an admission by Vodacom, and a fact that is often overlooked.

Below from MyBroadband:

Vodacom has admitted that the Please Call Me was invented and subsequently patented by MTN before Nkosana Kenneth Makate came up with the idea.

This is according to Nkateko Nyoka, chief officer of legal and regulatory affairs at Vodacom, who added that MTN launched its version, called Call Me, a month before Vodacom did…

The true inventor of the Please Call Me service is Ari Kahn, who consulted for MTN and created the “Call Me” technology in 2000.

The SA Patent office granted the Call Me patent to Kahn and MTN, and recognised Kahn as the inventor on 22 January 2001.

Oh, that might just change things.

According to Khan, here’s the timeline of how this played out:

• On 20 November 2000 Makate shares his idea with Vodacom and requests payment.
• Vodacom says “lets develop and use the idea” and if it proves technically feasible and commercially successful “we will reward you”.
• A week earlier on 15 November 2000, Kahn had already conceived the idea and briefed patent attorneys on 16 November to prepare a patent application for filing.
• Not only did Kahn conceive the idea first, he reduced it to practice first and sought IP protection first – filing a patent disclosing all the steps and methods required to deliver a working solution.
• MTN filed for IP protection first and it launched the service first on 23 January 2001 – seven weeks before Vodacom.
• The MTN service worked, and millions of users sent “Call me” messages over the MTN network during the first few weeks – which establishes prior art as Vodacom had yet to publicly disclose and launch their service.
• Vodacom launches a similar service on 15 March 2001. The service is a carbon copy of the MTN service and is even identically named “Call me” – it was later changed to “Please Call Me”.
• MTN immediately notifies Vodacom that they are infringing on their patent.
• Vodacom informs Makate that MTN already have the service and are threatening legal action for infringement.

Khan insists that Makate should not get a cent from Vodacom, was not the originator of the idea, and that “Vodacom did not benefit one iota from Makate’s contribution, but rather from MTN choosing not to enforce its rights at the time”.

Damn, maybe Makate should have taken that R10 million payout from last year.

Things may well come to a head later this week, with a Vodacom “shutdown” planned for Thursday, January 31, if Makate is not paid:

The PleaseCallMe Movement, headed by Modise Sekgothe, is also threatening to shut down Vodacom on 31 January if a settlement has not been reached.

The movement, which claims to be against corporate bullying and consumer injustice, said Vodacom owes Makate R70 billion for his idea.

“Join us as we will be shutting down Vodaworld in pursuit of justice for Nkosana Makate,” a recent flyer reads.

Yeah, the price is now R70 billion for some reason:

I reckon we’ll see the odd EFF red beret and BLF t-shirt floating around.

Who knows what the end result will be for Makate, but I don’t see Vodacom forking out R70 billion by Thursday.

[source:mybb]