According to the BBC News French phone equipment firm Alcatel has sued Microsoft, accusing it of infringing seven of its patents.
Alcatel has not revealed which Microsoft products it believes are in breach but says they relate to digital video and network communication.
It said the action, lodged in the US District Court for Eastern Texas was to protect its intellectual property.
The French firm added it hoped to resolve issues "through discussions rather than the courts".
Microsoft said that the suits appeared to relate to a long-running dispute between it and US-based Lucent Technologies which Alcatel is set to take over.
View: BBC News
Alcatel has not revealed which Microsoft products it believes are in breach but says they relate to digital video and network communication.
It said the action, lodged in the US District Court for Eastern Texas was to protect its intellectual property.
The French firm added it hoped to resolve issues "through discussions rather than the courts".
Microsoft said that the suits appeared to relate to a long-running dispute between it and US-based Lucent Technologies which Alcatel is set to take over.
View: BBC News
They want easy money...
think twice and know who you are talking about before saying that :p
That is something Microsoft is refusing to do with the Ballmer-claimed "infringements" that are in Linux.
Sadly just another reason i could care less about the level of corporate BS that goes on, there is rarely any genuine right or wrong about the various cases.
the novell/MS deal and BAllmers patent thing just happened. and MS also has to deal with about 5000 different Linux distros and all that crap. so it's a bit early and it's a bit more difficult.
and besides that. suign MS == easy money(and all companies want easy money, even Alcatel), Suing Linux... that's like claiming your coin back from the street beggar the next day.
You call this specific? "Alcatel has not revealed which Microsoft products it believes are in breach"
Which, roughly translated, means:
They're pulling a Microsoft on Microsoft.
You call this specific? "Alcatel has not revealed which Microsoft products it believes are in breach"
Which, roughly translated, means:
They're pulling a Microsoft on Microsoft.
[*] 6,661,799, "Method And Apparatus for Facilitating Peer-to-Peer Application Communication"
[*] 6,823,390, "Method Of Setting Up Data Communication With A Communication Means And Furthermore Program Modules And Means Therefor"
[*] 6,112,226, "Method And Apparatus For Concurrently Encoding And Tagging Digital Information For Allowing Non-Sequential Access During Playback"
[*] 5,864,682 and 5,659,539, "Method and Apparatus for Frame Accurate Access of Digital Audio-Visual Information."
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/feature...lcatelMSTV.mspx
http://www.alcatel.com/products/productsum...577241635.jhtml
Lets not forget these companies have a business relationship. This will pass, just like every other lawsuit. both companies will continue, with little to no impact to the industry. This may just be away to get enough capital to pay licensing and royalty fees on MS Intellectual Property.
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