Microsoft may have to pull its Office suite from the shelves in South Korea as a result of losing a patent lawsuit in that country, according to published reports. Several news outlets reported Monday that a South Korean Supreme Court ruling on Friday refused a request from Microsoft that patents obtained by Hankuk Aviation University professor Lee Keung-Haie in 1997 be nullified.
The decision strengthens the case of Lee and the company acting as his agent, called P and IB, which filed for damages against Microsoft in 2000 for infringing on Lee's patents, according to a report by the Agence France-Presse (AFP). Now that Microsoft's request has been struck down, P and IB leader Kim Kil-Hae said the company and Lee have a better chance at winning damages in their lawsuit and also in stopping the sale of the version of Office that includes the patented technology, according to a report by the AFP. Lee and P and IB are seeking damages of 70 billion won, or about $75 million.
View: The full story
News source: InfoWorld
The decision strengthens the case of Lee and the company acting as his agent, called P and IB, which filed for damages against Microsoft in 2000 for infringing on Lee's patents, according to a report by the Agence France-Presse (AFP). Now that Microsoft's request has been struck down, P and IB leader Kim Kil-Hae said the company and Lee have a better chance at winning damages in their lawsuit and also in stopping the sale of the version of Office that includes the patented technology, according to a report by the AFP. Lee and P and IB are seeking damages of 70 billion won, or about $75 million.
View: The full story News source: InfoWorld
Now, this article doesn't mention it, but some others I have read have stated Microsoft is now trying to gather up evidence of "prior art" to combat this patent. Don't ask me why a company with as large of a legal team as Microsoft's has negligently neglected to think of gathering "prior art" until they already lose a judgment...
Anyhow, current state of case is: Patent is valid. Microsoft is violating it.
Neowin reaction: Poor Microsoft.
See all this MS bashing in comments when MS sais someone infringes their patents.
This is Why all Software Patents must stop. Remember that MS is the main pusher of Software patents, this is just law of action and reaction. We can expect more of this in future, maybe not in USA but there still is the rest of the world...look through what is MS going through in Europe.
Funny part is, when Microsoft was much younger, Bill Gates opposed software patents. I suppose it was because they were a young company and didn't have many of their own (and IBM held most of the cards in that department). Now, they seem to have gathered up a bunch of their own and seem to enjoy playing the Patent Game (even making vague accusations maligning their competition).
Not that this is happening yet - just speculating.
Anyways, the only winners about software patent are the lawyers. They can earn millions with a software without put any finger in a keyboard.
If MS is forced to re-engineer some significant portion of the software, it could end up costing them many, many millions.
--h
1. The penalty of $75 million.
2. The losses from having to pull it from shelves.
3. The re-engineering costs.
They got what they deserve.
Ballme spreading FUD against Linux...now is Microsoft that violating a patent.
The irony...
Consequences for actions South Koreans get to use English only Office
Software Patents are an abomination and suck, but still i laffed this time.
Commenting has either been disabled on this article or you are not logged in. Click here to login or register, its free!
Note: Anonymous commenting is disabled in order to keep the quality of responses to a high standard.