Apple, Microsoft Group Wins Approval to Buy Nortel Patents (major blow to Google)

onehandle

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Mon Jul-11-11 07:29 PM
Original message

Apple, Microsoft Group Wins Approval to Buy Nortel Patents (major blow to Google)

Source: Bloomberg News

July 11 (Bloomberg) -- Apple Inc. and Microsoft Corp., in a joint venture called Rockstar Bidco LP, won court permission to buy the patent portfolio of Nortel Networks Corp. for $4.5 billion after outbidding Google Inc. in the biggest patent auction in history.

In a joint hearing today, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Kevin Gross in Wilmington, Delaware, and Ontario Superior Court Judge Geoffrey Morawetz in Toronto approved the sale of more than 6,000 patents and applications related to wireless and Internet technology.

�This truly is a �wow� transaction,� said David H. Botter, an attorney for the main committee of Nortel�s unsecured U.S. creditors.

After Nortel filed for bankruptcy in 2009, it began selling its businesses, raising about $3 billion before the June patent auction. The patent portfolio was the last major asset Nortel had to sell, and will boost creditor recoveries. The sale should close within 30 days, Lisa Schweitzer, a bankruptcy attorney for Nortel said in court today.

Read more: http://www.businessweek.com/news/2011-07-11/apple-microsoft-group-wins-approval-to-buy-nortel-patents.html

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freshwest

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Mon Jul-11-11 07:55 PM
Response to Original message

1. How do you suppose this will effect production and sales of computers, and sharing of data?

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onehandle

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Mon Jul-11-11 08:02 PM
Response to Reply #1

2. Little. Those who hold the patents will be paid by those who don't to use the technology.

The all pay each other one way or another. However, Google held the fewest patents before and now they are even further behind.

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Old and In the Way

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Mon Jul-11-11 08:09 PM
Response to Reply #1

3. The cost of Android OS will be going up.

I think Samsung is negotiating a $15/unit fee with MS on their Android phones. I assume that will get passed on to the consumer. Android is becoming hugely popular - I think I read that they are selling 500,000 Android devices a day. If so, MS could make more money charging for liscenses than they will probably make with their Windows OS for cellphone.

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freshwest

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Mon Jul-11-11 08:12 PM
Response to Reply #3

4. Sigh. I continue to be out of the loop on things like that. I'm keeping it simple.

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Angleae

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Mon Jul-11-11 08:39 PM
Response to Reply #3

5. Why is Samsung negotiation with MS for android?

Doesn't android belong to Google?

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Old and In the Way

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Tue Jul-12-11 02:16 PM
Response to Reply #5

8. I read it over at Gizmodo, I think.

It may be a preemptive offer with linkage to the MS Windows OS for other models that Samsung wants to market.

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Angleae

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Tue Jul-12-11 03:03 PM
Response to Reply #8

9. I think I understand.

It's not android Samsung is negotiating. Android is Google's OS for phones, not a phone itself.

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Old and In the Way

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Tue Jul-12-11 03:08 PM
Response to Reply #9

10. Right...but MS can go after the companies using Androoid in their phones if they think

they have a patent infringement case. Not sure what Google's deal is with the cell phone manufacturer's with regards to sales of Android. But MS probably can do better getting a % of the total cost of the phone, then just a % of the OS from Google.

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dbonds

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Mon Jul-11-11 10:31 PM
Response to Reply #3

6. Well at present, only HTC pays anything for Android

Edited on Mon Jul-11-11 10:32 PM by dbonds

And that is to Microsoft. Microsoft already makes an order of magnitude more money off Android than it does of Windows OS based phones. Google didn't seriously want the patents, they were there bidding to drive up the price. But look at all their bids, they are mathematical constants such as Pi.

Oh, and no company is required to pay MS anything at the moment, or possible at all. But HTC signed a deal because MS pressured them.

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Old and In the Way

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Tue Jul-12-11 03:18 PM
Response to Reply #6

11. I wonder what Google sells Android to the various cell phone OEMs for?

I thought it was pretty much an open source project....if so, I would think the cost to pay patent fees would be a lot less than buying the patents outright....and that cost will get passed on to the consumer. And if they are giving it away, can Apple/MS really expect to collect off Google or are their sights set on the phone OEMs who are using the OS in the phones? Android is established now, so I think the public is not going to care if they have to pay a premium for this OS. Having been a user of an Android phone for about 6 weeks, I can tell you that I'd have paid an extra $20.00 for a phone with this OS vs. the crappy MS WinMobile 6.5 I had on my old Samsung Sega.

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dbonds

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Tue Jul-12-11 03:30 PM
Response to Reply #11

12. It is my understanding that Google lets them use it for free.

Edited on Tue Jul-12-11 03:32 PM by dbonds

Google has many services and products it gives away for free. They got into this market because they thought the iPhone and other phone OSes were too closed. So they created an open software approach. Here is a blurb from Wikipedia about license

Licensing
With the exception of brief update periods, Android has been available under a free software/open source license since October, 21 2008. Google published the entire source code (including network and telephony stacks)<36> under an Apache License.<37> Google also keeps the reviewed issues list publicly open for anyone to see and comment.<38>
Even though the software is open-source, device manufacturers cannot use Google's Android trademark unless Google certifies that the device complies with their Compatibility Definition Document (CDD). Devices must also meet this definition to be eligible to license Google's closed-source applications, including the Android Market.<39>
In September 2010, Skyhook Wireless filed a lawsuit against Google in which they alleged that Google had used the compatibility document to block Skyhook's mobile positioning service (XPS) from Motorola's Android mobile devices.<40> In December 2010 a judge denied Skyhook's motion for preliminary injunction, saying that Google had not closed off the possibility of accepting a revised version of Skyhook's XPS service, and that Motorola had terminated their contract with Skyhook because Skyhook wanted to disable Google's location data collection functions on Motorola's devices, which would have violated Motorola's obligations to Google and its carriers.<41>
In early 2011 Google chose to temporarily withhold the source code to the tablet-only Honeycomb release, which called into question the "open-ness" of this Android release.<42> The reason, according to Andy Rubin in an official Android blog post, was because Honeycomb was rushed for production of the Motorola Xoom,<43> and they didn't want third parties creating a "really bad user experience" by attempting to put onto smartphones a version of Android intended for tablets.<44> Google later confirmed that the Honeycomb source code would not be released until after it was merged with the Gingerbread release in Ice Cream Sandwich.<45>

Oh, and most of those patents weren't that relevant. Many were social app type patents. And Google does not sell the hardware, so none of those were relevant to Google.

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saras

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Mon Jul-11-11 10:44 PM
Response to Original message

7. Unless you're incredibly geeky, you won't notice anything but price increases

The interesting ones are where companies REFUSE to license technology, either because they don't want to benefit a competitor, or because they don't want a particular device or service to even appear in the marketplace.

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hunter

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Tue Jul-12-11 06:03 PM
Response to Original message

13. What is the public benifit if patents live on when a corporation dies?

I understand the case for individuals who have family to support, but why can't corporate patents simply pass into the public domain? Wouldn't human society overall be better off if that was the case?

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