The Three Laws of US Robotics

The kids and I have just been to see the movie I, Robot. I went because it was supposed to be based on Isaac Asimov’s book. (It was — loosely.) But the really funny bit was that the Evil Company in the film was called ‘USR’ — which in my day was the abbreviation for US Robotics, a perfectly respectable manufacturer of rather nice analog modems. I’ve just checked, and it is still a respectable manufacturer of same (and it still has USR in its domain name). So how did the movie makers get away with giving the baddies the same handle? Did they pay a hefty ransom?