Back in May, ZeniMax Media filed a lawsuit against Oculus VR and its founder, Palmer Luckey. The lawsuit accused Oculus of "unlawful exploitation of intellectual property." This property included trade secrets, copyrighted computer code, and "technical know-how" related to virtual reality technology. The company also alleged that Oculus received said intellectual property under a binding Non-Disclosure Agreement.
"All efforts by ZeniMax to resolve this matter amicably have been unsuccessful," ZeniMax announced last month. "Oculus has recently issued a public statement remarkably claiming that 'ZeniMax has never contributed IP or technology to Oculus.' Meanwhile, Luckey has held himself out to the public as the visionary developer of virtual reality technology, when in fact the key technology Luckey used to establish Oculus was developed by ZeniMax."
On Wednesday, Oculus VR fired back in a formal response filed in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Texas Dallas Division. The company claims that ZeniMax became interested thanks to Facebook's purchase of Oculus VR for $2 billion USD -- that the claims against Oculus weren't made until ZeniMax saw a "perceived chance for a quick payout."
"ZeniMax's Complaint falsely claims ownership in Oculus VR technology in a transparent attempt to take advantage of the Oculus VR sale to Facebook," Oculus writes in the response. "There is not a line of ZeniMax code or any of its technology in any Oculus VR product."
The response then describes how Luckey designed the Rift, presents a few photos of prototypes as evidence, and talks about the relationship between Luckey and John Carmack. As we already know, Carmack was a ZeniMax employee until he quit the company back in November 2013 to work full-time as Oculus' Chief Technical Officer.
"ZeniMax had a golden opportunity to make an early investment in Oculus VR and chose to pass," Oculus's response states. "The lawsuit is nothing more than ZeniMax seeking to correct for a massive missed opportunity through the assertion of meritless litigation."
To read the full response, head here.
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