ADOBE RECOVERS $1.25 MILLION FROM PIRATE RESELLER.

Setting legal precedent when it comes to copyright, Adobe Systems Incorporated (Nasdaq: ADBE) has announced that its case against pirate reseller, One Stop Micro d.b.a. Signal Computing, resulted in both a $1.25 million settlement and a groundbreaking legal opinion regarding software license agreements.

Adobe sued One Stop Micro d.b.a. Signal Computing, a reseller located in Red Bank, New Jersey, and its principals Lawrence Firestone and Stephen Finnegan, on several claims including copyright and trademark infringement. In its complaint filed before the Federal District Court in San Jose, Calif., Adobe accused the reseller of improperly obtaining academic versions of Adobe software, deliberately altering that software by removing the "educational" designation from the packages and then distributing the academic versions to non-educational end-users who believed that they were obtaining retail versions of the software.

The U.S. District Court in San Jose found that One Stop's acts constituted trademark infringement and in a precedent-setting published opinion, the Court held that One Stop also committed copyright infringement as a matter of law. Prior to this opinion, the law was unsettled as to whether copyright holders, like Adobe, could place restrictions on the distribution of their software products through license agreements.

"This landmark decision leaves no room for doubt: software distribution outside the scope of a license agreement is copyright infringement," said Colleen Pouliot, senior vice president, general counsel and corporate secretary for Adobe.

As part of its widespread campaign to enforce copyright compliance, Adobe has partnered with anti-piracy organizations such as the Business Software Alliance (www.bsa.org) and the Software Publisher's Association (www.spa.org) to investigate and litigate against end-user and reseller companies. In addition, the company educates customers about proper software licensing and encourages them to report purveyors of unauthorized Adobe products to [e-mail].

Founded in 1982, Adobe Systems Incorporated (www.adobe.com) builds award-winning software solutions for Web and print publishing. Its graphic design, imaging, dynamic media, and authoring tools enable customers to create, publish and deliver visually rich content for various types of media. Headquartered in San Jose, California, Adobe is the third largest PC software company in the U.S., with annual revenues exceeding $1 billion.