Patent licensing company Intellectual Ventures (IV) filed an infringement suit against three of the big-four US operators, noting in a blog post that “the wireless communications networks of AT&T, Sprint and T-Mobile USA use a variety of important technologies covered by Intellectual Ventures’ patents.”

According to Melissa Finocchio, chief litigation counsel of IV, “we previously attempted to discuss licensing options with each of these companies, but none were responsive. We filed a complaint for infringement today in the US District Course of Delaware, to get these three companies on a course toward compensating IV for the value of the inventions they use in delivering their wireless services.”

Reuters reports that former Microsoft executive and IV co-founder, Nathan Myhrvold, said that Verizon Wireless is excluded from the suit because a licensing agreement is already in place between these parties.

The patent listing notes numerous US patents, with titles such as “Transmission of Multimedia Messages Between Mobile Station Terminals,” “Method and Apparatus for Monitoring Users of a Communications System,” and “Short Message Server Without Local Customer Database.”

Much of the focus appears to be on the transmission of traffic across networks, with MMS messaging also mentioned frequently. IV is seeking “all appropriate damages…for the defendant’s past infringement, and any continuing or future infringements of the patents-in-suit.”

In the filing, IV said that it has a portfolio of “more than 35,000 assets, and more than 3,000 of those patents and patent applications are the result of Intellectual Ventures’ own invention efforts, both in-house and with Intellectual Ventures’ inventor networks.” It notes that it has “paid individual investors more than US$400 million for their inventions,” and “earned more than US$2 billion by licensing these patents to some of the world’s most innovative and successful technology companies.”

Late last year, IV began legal action against Motorola Mobility.