Things just got a bit interesting in the e-reader market and in many ways, we should have seen this coming.

Remember the “Alex” e-reader device (top left) announced by Spring Design the day before Barnes & Noble formally announced the Nook device (top right)? It was a dual display e-reader based around the Android OS which we commented was very similar to the upcoming Nook device. Well guess what? We weren’t the only ones to think so as Spring Design announced today they have filed a lawsuit against Barnes & Noble for violating its intellectual property rights with the new Nook e-reader.

Eric Kmiec, VP of Sales and Marketing for Spring Design had this to say in their press release:

“We showed the Alex e-book design to Barnes & Noble in good faith with the intention of working together to provide a superior dual screen e-book to the market.”

Spring Design claims they first developed and filed for patents on the “Alex” e-reader back in 2006. Further, the company states:

“Since the beginning of 2009 Spring and Barnes & Noble worked within a non-disclosure agreement, including many meetings, emails and conference calls with executives ranging up to the president of Barnes and Noble.com, discussing confidential information regarding the features, functionality and capabilities of Alex. Throughout, Barnes & Noble’s marketing and technical executives extolled Alex’s “innovative” features, never mentioning their use of those features until the public disclosure of the Nook.”

Now the real question is – did Barnes & Noble actually violate any IPs with the Nook? Did they create the Nook independently of the Alex? Can any of this be proved in the court of law?

We’ll say this much – Barnes & Noble certainly doesn’t need this legal trouble if it plans on combating Amazon.com in the e-reader space. Here’s hoping Spring Design and Barnes & Noble can work things out because the Nook certainly is promising .

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