The Optical Disc Patents That Cost Pioneer $200 Million

In 1989, Pioneer paid $200 million for the company that licensed an inventor's optical disc patents. Here is the story behind them. In 1958, an engineer named David Paul Gregg began to imagine storing video on a disc and reading it with light. His patents were bought by MCA in 1968, became the foundation of the LaserDisc, and ended up with Pioneer. A patent application he filed in June 1968 was not granted until January 1990. In 1998, a federal court in Delaware ruled that a manufacturer's compact discs infringed it. The last LaserDisc ever pressed was a karaoke ballad. The last players ended for a reason that had nothing to do with demand. And what Gregg himself was paid is not in any record we could find. A note on the numbers: the $200 million Pioneer announced in October 1989 bought DiscoVision Associates, a company that licensed a worldwide portfolio of optical disc patents. Gregg's patents were part of that portfolio, among many others. The yen figure in the video comes from Pioneer's own filing for the year ended March 2003. Chapters 0:00 The last LaserDisc 0:51 Start with the man 1:33 A patent that wasn't his 2:07 The money problem 2:42 Three applications 3:13 MCA buys the patents 3:25 Transparent versus reflective 4:04 Atlanta, three stores 4:45 Pioneer takes over 5:19 The $200 million price tag 5:57 The patent arrives 6:30 The lawsuit 7:32 The defense 7:52 The ruling 8:41 What Gregg didn't live to see 9:08 The patents outlived him 9:35 LaserDisc in the West and Japan 10:24 The last disc 11:12 Pioneer ends the players 11:56 The reason: parts 12:32 What the format left behind 13:04 The circle Sources DiscoVision Associates v. Disc Manufacturing, 25 F. Supp. 2d 301 (D. Del. 1998): https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/... US Patents 3,350,503, 3,430,966, 3,530,258 and 4,893,297 (Google Patents, Justia Patents) UPI, "Pioneer to buy DiscoVision Associates," October 19, 1989: https://www.upi.com/Archives/1989/10/... Pioneer Corporation, Form 6-K, June 18, 2003 (SEC): https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/da... Pioneer, "LaserDisc player production ending," January 14, 2009: https://jpn.pioneer/ja/corp/news/pres... Nikkei xTech, January 14, 2009; Oricon, May 20, 2007 DiscoVision Associates history: http://www.discovision.com/DVA/History Computer History Museum, "1972: Optical Laser Disc Player is demonstrated" Narration is generated with AI. Script research and writing by the channel. Illustrations are labeled on screen. If we got something wrong, tell us in the comments and we will correct it.