Honeywell vs. Sperry Rand trial begins

In 1964, Sperry Rand Corporation received a patent, initially filed by J. Presper Eckert and John Mauchly, for the ENIAC computer developed during World War II. Sperry Rand sued Honeywell on claims of patent infringement, while Honeywell filed a suit charging Sperry Rand with monopolistic practices and fraud, seeking to invalidate the patent. Judge John Sirica ruled that Sperry Rand's patent was unenforceable, partly due to problems with the filing by Eckert and Mauchly, as well as previous publications such as John von Neumann's First Draft of a Report on the EDVAC. Perhaps the most significant finding was that “Eckert and Mauchly did not themselves invent the automatic electronic computer, but instead derived that subject matter from one Dr. John Vincent Atanasoff.” The ruling placed the idea for the electronic digital computer in the public domain so that any company could pursue computer design and manufacture without having to pay royalties for the basic idea of the computer.