<Given your past comments ... both here on this board and others....I am not surprised you would take that position. You seem to have an inclination to believe management in most of the companies you post on here in IV are poor at negotiating>

It's more than negotiation skills. Management is evaluated and often pressured by share price. A 50% drop YTD puts the gun to their head as investors are leaving droves. They probably felt they had to make a deal.

Did it alter the price of the sale or force the sale?

Educated guesses are all we can make given what we know about the patents. We do know their past comments revealed concern about the share price. We know that they added to the buyback as well at the same time this was announced.

This circumstantial evidence strongly suggests that this sale was a response to the share price. But as I said twice now, this deal is still be a good thing as it monetizes patents that to date haven't been adding to revenues.