Google SVP and Senior Legal Officer, David Drummond has blogged about the recent trouble Google and their manufacturing partners have had over patents with the likes of Apple, Microsoft, and Oracle.
Android’s success has yielded something else: a hostile, organized campaign against Android by Microsoft, Oracle, Apple and other companies, waged through bogus patents.
He also complained about Apple and Microsoft teaming up to out-bid Google for Novell and Nortel patents and calls for a Justice Department investigation into anti-competitive behavior while at the same time indicating Google would beef up their own patent portfolio.
He didn’t seem to indicate Google would be filing to intervene in the Lodsys lawsuits against developers, which Apple has done. With Samsung delaying the launch of the Galaxy Tab 10.1 in Australia due to litigation with Apple, and HTC paying Microsoft $5 per Android handset in licensing fees, Google does have a lot to worry about.
While Android is fast approaching majority share of the smartphone market, Apple enjoys 66% of the profits, and as we’ve said before, while Apple seems content at making Android uglier, Microsoft wants to make an already less-profitable Android platform even costlier.
We called our most recent podcast with FOSS Patent’s Florian Mueller, World War Patents for a reason, and it seems the battles are just beginning.
[Google Blog via Android Central]
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