Uniloc claims sum in security patent dispute
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(NEW YORK) Microsoft Corp, the world's largest software maker, stole a Singapore company's patented invention used to deter piracy and should pay more than US$558 million in royalties, a lawyer told a federal court jury.
Uniloc Singapore Private Ltd and Uniloc USA Inc, based in Irvine, California, claim that Microsoft used Uniloc security technology to earn billions of dollars. Microsoft saw Uniloc's patent and used it without permission, the lawyer, Paul Hayes, told jurors on Tuesday during closing arguments in Providence, Rhode Island.
Microsoft had 'nothing unique going in' to create its anti-piracy software, said Mr Hayes, of Mintz, Levin, Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky & Popeo in Boston.
Microsoft, based in Redmond, Washington, contends that it uses a different method to prevent the use of unauthorised copies of its software. It also challenged whether Uniloc's patent covers a new invention.
'There is no infringement in this case,' Frank Scherkenbach, an attorney representing Microsoft who is with Boston's Fish & Richardson, said on Tuesday in his closing argument. 'The technology is fundamentally different.'
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Microsoft claims that Uniloc's patent is obvious and should be deemed invalid. In addition, Mr Scherkenbach said that the request for more than half a billion dollars in damages was 'extreme and out of whack'. Between US$3 million and US$7 million would be 'generous', if the jury were to find infringement, he said.
The jury began deliberations on Tuesday afternoon. The trial began on March 23.
The case is directed at Microsoft's Windows XP operating system and some Office programs.
Windows Vista, the newest Microsoft system used to run personal computers, is not part of the case. Microsoft still sells XP in some cases, such as in inexpensive laptop computers. Windows runs about 95 per cent of the world's PCs.
Uniloc claims that it is entitled to US$2.50 for each of the 223 million activations of a product that has Windows XP, Office XP, Windows Server 2003 and Office 2003 sold since October 2003, when the suit was filed. Microsoft, while challenging the patent and infringement claims, said that if it lost, the most Uniloc would be entitled to is about five US cents for each US activation.
The dispute is over programs to deter piracy.
The patent - first issued to Australian Ric Richardson, based on work he did in the early 1990s - covers a software registration system. According to court filings in the case, Mr Richardson was working to eliminate 'casual copying', in which a person installs a single program on more computers than permitted.
Uniloc claims that Mr Richardson showed the software program to Microsoft in 1993 under a pledge that Microsoft would not try to break down the code to duplicate it. Uniloc claims that Microsoft did that and, in 1997 or 1998, began pilot programs with a similar software program.
Microsoft countered that it developed its own system that works differently from Uniloc's, and that the Uniloc patent does not cover a new inventions.
The company also said that it first learned of Uniloc's patent and infringement claims when the suit was filed.
Mr Scherkenbach said Microsoft engineers had evaluated Mr Richardson's software and later decided that it was of no use to them.
Microsoft had won the case in 2006, when US District Judge William Smith ruled that the software maker used a different type of encryption technology from that covered by Uniloc's patent. An appeals court overturned the judge, saying that there was a 'genuine issue of material fact'. -- Bloomberg
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