This isn’t Android Central, so any time we write about Motorola they seem to be duking it out with Microsoft. It looks like we’ll be hearing less of them going forward. Mostly because Microsoft just won the second of two trials against Motorola. Details after the break.
So what did the jury in a federal court in Seattle decide? They decided that Motorola broke agreements to license certain patents at fair and reasonable rates with standard-setting bodies. For doing that, the jury awarded Microsoft $14 million dollars in damages. However, this is only half of what Microsoft wanted from Motorola. That 14 million number represents $11 million Microsoft spent building a factory in Germany to get around an import ban on Xbox 360’s and $3 million in legal fees (should have been a lawyer).
Motorola is expected to appeal this decision. Even though Google bought Motorola after these court battles with Microsoft started, many see this as a proxy fight between Google and Microsoft. Many people also suspect that Google bought Motorola for valuable patents. Not exactly working out how they hoped.
Source: Reuters
