NEC Australia sued over iPhone VoIP project

An iPhone app developer that customised its VoIP client exclusively for NEC Australia has claimed in the Federal Court the vendor reneged on a licence deal and "secretly developed or obtained" a replica product to shut them out.

Hi-Tech Telecom launched the action against NEC Australia today in the hope of being paid for work it claims to have completed to integrate its iPhone client with NEC's phone systems.

Hi-Tech created an app that allowed the iPhone to control internet multimedia streams, transmitted through 3G and Wi-Fi networks, in a system known as session-initiated protocol or 'SIP'. 

The app was originally written for internet telephony provider Pennytel in September, 2008 to enable users to make cheaper phone calls by routing the calls over an internet data service.

Hi-Tech alleged that NEC contacted the developer to see whether the Pennytel client could be adapted "to work with NEC's branded SIP PABX telephone systems", the integrator claimed in a statement filed with the court.

Hi-Tech alleged that NEC Australia had made representations that neither it, nor its Japanese parent, had "its own iPhone VoIP client", were developing one or could replicate Hi-Tech's product at the time of the initial enquiries.

In return, NEC would pay a "fee" for the adaptation and charge its customers a "licence fee" to install the app on their corporate iPhones, according to Hi-Tech.

The client to work with NEC's kit

Hi-Tech alleged it occurred at least four months after it had "successfully adapted" the client to work with NEC's kit and at a time when "many other competitors of [NEC] were already developing their own versions of the iPhone VoIP client".

By mid-June last year, Hi-Tech alleged that NEC told it to "control the licensing, revenue and distribution" of the adapted voice over internet protocol (VoIP) client, market it "directly to NEC's customers" via Apple's AppStore and pay NEC a percentage of revenues.

The next month

Hi-Tech alleged that the next month, NEC announced a "partnership with Optus in providing an application that had the same functionality as the adapted iPhone VoIP client".

And it alleged that "at a time not known to [Hi-Tech], [NEC] had secretly developed or secretly obtained its own iPhone VoIP client or other means to replicate its function, or in the alternative... became aware that [parent] NEC Corporation had developed or obtained its own iPhone VoIP client or other means to replicate its function, and failed to inform [Hi-Tech]".