For more than ten years, a one-man steel fabrication business in rural central Alberta used Tekla Structures without a license. Over those years Trimble sent repeated notices, and he ignored them.
Every chance to settle
In 2018, Trimble’s local reseller made a final attempt. Over five months it offered him financing, a lease, and a subscription plan that would count toward a perpetual license. Each time he said payment was on its way, and each time it didn’t arrive. The reseller set an October deadline, and when that passed the case went to ITCA.
ITCA first tried to resolve the matter directly. In reply, he claimed that a US company he owned held a “cross-border” license covering his work in Canada. No such license existed.
From strategy to service
ITCA then worked with the law firm Gowling WLG on a litigation strategy. A formal demand letter went unanswered, and in January 2019 Trimble and BuildingPoint Canada filed a copyright claim in the Federal Court of Canada.
The claim had to be served on him in person. Finding him took hours of driving on rural back roads.
What the court ordered
Once served, he settled within weeks. On March 25, 2019, the Federal Court issued a consent judgment that:
- declared Trimble the copyright owner of Tekla Structures 21.0 and 21.1;
- found that the defendant had infringed it;
- permanently barred him from further infringement;
- ordered him to pay C$60,747.50.
“Size and distance don’t change the law. A sole proprietor at the end of a country road gets the same attention as a multinational. If infringers ignore the publisher, the reseller, and us, they end up in court.”
Chris Luijten, founder of ITCA
Source: Federal Court of Canada, Order of Justice Manson, March 25, 2019.
Read the judgment
Skip to PDF contentHeader photo: Joli Rumi, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons (cropped and toned).
