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Microsoft Found Guilty of Patent Infringement

Posted by samzenpus on from the pay-up dept.

Spy der Mann writes "Microsoft has been found guilty of patent infringement and ordered to pay a Guatamalan inventor Carlos Armando Amado almost $9m in damages. The US District Court of Central California court ruled that Microsoft had infringed on his intellectual property and ordered it to pay him $8.96m. The patent in question is a method to transfer data between Microsoft Excel and Microsoft Access using a single spreadsheet."

2 of 342 comments (clear)

  1. umm... no. by geoffspear · · Score: 5, Informative

    Patent infringement is not a crime, so they were not, in fact, found "guilty".

    --
    Don't blame me; I'm never given mod points.
  2. You did't get it by xbsd · · Score: 5, Informative

    So.. he patented a way for Microsoft Excel to work with Microsoft Access.. both products that Microsoft makes. Then he sued Microsoft??? I know.. i patent a way for Apple Intel to work with Apple PowerPC, no one would ever think of that.

    You didn't get it:
    1. The guy came up with a technique to interact with Access and Excel while doing graduate studies and gets a patent.
    2. He approached Microsoft Corp. in the 90s and offered them his patent. Microsoft rejects the idea and say they're not interested.
    3. About the same time, Microsoft adds the same technique to his products, makes a great deal of it and gets millions in revenue.
    4. Then, and only then, the guy went to court, proved that he was the first to come up with the technique , proved that he approached Microsoft, proved that he showed it to them before they ever thought about it and then gets a fair amount of money.

    I don't support software patents, but if Microsoft is promoting that nasty game, they have to obey the nasty game's rules.