FAST wins £300,000 settlement for member

Anti-piracy and licensing watchdog scores victory against US-based chemical transportation firm caught with unlicensed software

The Federation Against Software Theft (The Federation) has secured a £300,000($550,000) settlement fee for software vendor member Achiever Business Solutions (ABS) in a case of software licence infringement by a US chemical transportation organisation.

The unnamed chemical transportation organisation was reported to The Federation after initial negotiations for suspected unlicensed software use broke down between ABS and the US organisation.

Robert Dent, chief executive of Achiever Business Solutions, said: "Where suspected illegal use of our products occurs, we have a policy of strict application of the law to regain lost revenue and will pursue protection of our rights vigorously."
Dent added that The Federation had been instrumental in enabling it to recover lost revenues. Since 2003, ABS has also recovered over £1m of lost revenue with the help of The Federation.

For example, in May The Federation helped ABS to secure a $75,000 settlement against an unnamed global courier company for software infringement.

John Lovelock, director general of The Federation, said: "It's a case of getting communication going between the offender and the licence holder. A couple of people were involved on this case and we spent a couple of months on it."