Looks like the Autobots are coming for Asus as Hasbro has begun legal proceedings against the tech company for "misappropriating" its intellectual property by naming the Asus Transformer Prime thusly.
As you may recall from the cartoons of yore or Michael Bay's explosive additive-fuelled 3D action reboots, the leader of the human-friendly Autobots in the Transformers franchise is named Optimus Prime.
It's not a massive leap from Transformer Prime to a Transformer called Optimus Prime, but it is a fairly hefty jump from tablet-cum-notebook to a fictional robot and its pals.
Toys exiting pram
Still, Hasbro maintains that it's a viable case, with a spokesperson saying, "The specific actions we are taking today against Asus underscores yet again Hasbro's willingness to pursue companies who misappropriate our intellectual property for their own financial gain."
At worst, it seems that Asus may be strongarmed into changing the name of the slate (and covering damages), which is a fate significantly better than that of Samsung and HTC whose legal wranglings with Apple could see their products pulled from shop shelves altogether.
And thank goodness, as the Asus Eee Pad Transformer Prime is a prime example of an Android tablet done right - we gave it 4.5 stars in our in-depth review, and with Ice Cream Sandwich coming in January 2012, it's set to get even more impressive.
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