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Microsoft loses Word patent battle

by on02 April 2010

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No pay, no play


The US
court has wrapped up the appeals process which meant that a tiny Canadian company i4i won a huge legal battle and $290 million in fines against Microsoft.

I4i claimed that Microsoft had nicked some of its software which it used in Word. The court agreed and decided that the compontant was worth more than $80 of Office's price. The outfit won another round Thursday when US federal appeals court turned down Microsoft's plea for hearing of the case by a full bench.

However the patent pertains to the use of technology that can open documents using the XML computer programming language. The Canadian software company had said Microsoft stole this technology when it created Word 2003 and Word 2007 software.

Microsoft has complying with the ruling, the software giant had stopped selling the infringing Word 2007 and Office 2007 from January 11. Instead it had introduced a Word 2007 software patch removing infringing custom XML markup when a document is opened.

Not surprisingly 4i chairman Loudon Owen is happy with the ruling saying that this has been a long and arduous process, but this decision is a powerful reinforcement of the message that smaller enterprises and inventors who own intellectual property can and will be protected.

So this is a David and Goliath story right? Possibly. However in this case one has to wonder if Redmond is being treated that fairly by the courts. $80 for using XML is a large chunk of Office's price tag and the fact it has been deleted suggests that it was never that important in the first place.

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