Adobe is also filing an arbitration proceeding in London seeking affirmation of the same contractual rights with respect to Agfa Monotype fonts. Adobe said yesterday that it attempted to resolve this matter informally with Monotype and ITC, but was unsuccessful.
In addition, Adobe has asked the court to declare that Adobe's popular Acrobat product does not violate certain provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) as claimed by ITC and Agfa Monotype.
Adobe believes these claims are being made to give ITC and Agfa leverage in the contractual disputes. Adobe disputes this claim and is asking the court to rule that there is no violation of the DMCA.
Jim Heeger, a senior vice president with Adobe, said:
"Many years ago Adobe anticipated the shift to electronic documents. At that time, we obtained the embedding rights from our font partners necessary to permit the creation of electronic documents. We are now defending the rights we obtained for our customers to continue to conduct business in the electronic age."