So I keep reading about Microsoft, Apple, and RIM teaming up against Google to buy some patents. Here’s what I’m not finding:
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These patents were already ‘owned’ before. So wouldn’t Android’s cost to distribute remain unchanged? Why would Google owe more now than before for shipping it?
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What are the patents for?
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Can’t Google just rework a couple core pieces of the OS to avoid infringing on the patent and therefore not have to pay? Seems it would be a sweet revenge against three competitors that got in its way.
IANA Patent Lawyer, just a layman who’s been following this for a long time
To answer your first question, if Google owns the patent it doesn’t have to pay royalties to itself. It also won’t sue itself for infringing on its own patent. If the patent is owned by someone else, Google may have to pay royalties for use of the technology (this is why Microsoft makes money on Android phones sold by HTC) and may have to spend a lot of money defending itself from an IP lawsuit. IP lawsuits are extremely expensive to defend and I’ve seen a lot of these larger suits exhaust the entire appeals process and appeals are not cheap, either. Or a competitor may be able to make use of the technology as well (this is one reason it’s been theorized that Google elected to go it alone for many of these patent packages) and deprive Google of the ability to use the new patents as a means of going after its competitors. Although Apple and Microsoft have received flak for chasing after infringers of their patents, Google (and its Android partners) have also done the same thing, and it stands to reason that the Nortel portfolio may have given Google the ammunition to sue to other companies, much as Google will run the risk of being sued itself when the portfolio changes hands.
Second question, the patents are all over the place. Most news articles have been light on details of the actual patents (vaguely referring to them as covering semiconductors, networking technology etc) but rest assured they cover very basic things like moving data around a network, means and implementation of accessing data over a network on a device, inputting data into a device. Nortel had over 6000 patents in its portfolio, there’s a lot of ground to cover.
Third, maybe, maybe not. A lot of these patents are so vague that they don’t really cover the exact means of what they are trying to accomplish, so a basic rewrite may or may not change the means in which the given action is being performed. Additionally, rewriting the code won’t alter the damage that has been done through the millions and millions of devices already released. Even if Google had a means for updating every infringing device it ever sold (which it does not) it would not do much to alter their past infringing liability. It might be save them the trouble of future royalties and licensing but the patent holders can still demonstrate that the past action caused them harm and attempt to recover those damages.
It also worth pointing out that companies assemble large patent portfolios in order to make it very hard for other large companies to sue them. Patents can be vague enough, or broad enough that should Google try to sue Apple (say) for infringing a patent, they can be assured that Apple will be able to dip into their portfolio of patents and sue them back.
The game is played at a higher level. Apple recently settled with Nokia over raft of GSM related patents. They fought hard not to have to pay royalties. Part of the reason was that the GSM “club” of the existing manufacturers had assembled a cross licensing system where they exchanged rights to use one another’s patents. Apple was not in the club, and was regarded as a latecomer, as well as possibly the most obvious commercial threat. Apple tried to sue back with GUI patents, essentially in a effort to join the club. In the end, although we don’t know the actual terms of the agreement, it would appear that Apple didn’t manage it. You can assume that spates of large companies suing one another over patent infringements is a symptom of deeper questions and tensions.
A large patent portfolio allows the larger companies to squash startups. In areas like mobile phones it is essentially impossible to make anything that doesn’t infringe someone’s patent. Things are just too complex, and there are a lot of very poor patents awarded that can be construed to cover all manner of obvious ideas. A startup can be bled to death quickly whilst fighting, even if the patent is eventually overturned or they win the case. The converse is when a small company holds a patent that turns out to cover something critical. They are a real problem for the big companies. Typically such patents end up owned, not by legitimate manufacturers, but by companies that exist only to exploit the patent. (Often owned by lawyers.) These guys are not interested in cross licensing, and are not making anything, so can’t be sued for some other possible patent infringement. All they want is money, preferably lots of it.