Microsoft Sues Salesforce.com Over Patents

WrongSizeGlass writes "CNET is reporting that Microsoft is suing Salesforce.com in Seattle federal court, claiming it infringes on nine patents. Two of the patents in question are a 'system and method for providing and displaying a Web page having an embedded menu' and a 'method and system for stacking toolbars in a computer display.'" Microsoft says it first notified Salesforce more than a year ago about the alleged infringement.

Comments

Re:What's the angle?

[Yo Grark]

Yes, SF continues to win contracts from Dynamics or whatever MS is calling their latest CRM this week.

SF are just WAY too nimble in their catering to companies needs while MS expects companies to buy upgraded hardware, software, consultants, etc to conform data to THEIR system.

SF: Here you go, we figured out how to provide x for no extra charge.
MS: Sorry we can't do that without $100,000 and even then there's no guarantee.

So yeah, SF is kickin MS's a$$ets and putting their attempts at a CRM to shame.

Next up, MS buys SF.com. *sigh*

- Yo Grark

Bill Gates

[Enderandrew]

I remember a few years back when Bill Gates said that Microsoft had been sued over patents, but never sued anyone else. They insisted that like IBM and other big companies, they had massive patent portfolios just to protect themselves. But then they sued TomTom over FAT patents and now this. What happened to Microsoft doesn't believe in suing over patents? Is this indicative of Gates handing the reigns over to Ballmer, the guy who threatened to sue anyone running Linux?

Re:Patent titles in the summary are meaningless

[phantomfive]

I love the fact that the '768 patent uses Netscape in its screenshots. The main claim seems to be that they are using an applet (or separate chunk of code) to create a menu.

So the standard HTML drop down menu wouldn't apply, it is a menu created with a separate chunk of code. I'm not sure I saw that kind of thing before 1998, so there may not be any prior art. However, that doesn't mean its not a silly patent. It should have been obvious to any programmer who was thinking about that sort of thing. I don't think I even have a problem so much with software patents, although they are a bit annoying. I have a problem with patents that are so obvious that anyone could figure them out. 1-click purchase is an obvious example.

Re:What's the angle?

[mjwx]

Yes, SF continues to win contracts from Dynamics or whatever MS is calling their latest CRM this week.

SaleForce.com is winning customers away from Dynamics because Dynamics is an absolute pile of crap. If you managed to wade though the absolutely stupid way to customise Dynamics 3.0 you quickly found out that you needed to start from scratch again with 4.0 because MS changed everything and it's still a pile of crap.

Businesses wont use Dynamics despite MS giving away free licenses with every MAPS and partner subscription.

Oh, and the reasons the parent mentioned.

Re:Patent Armageddon?

[NickFortune]

I thought these two were kinda well behaved and used patents only as a defensive measure, guess I was wrong.

That's a good point. Wasn't it only yesterday that we had a half dozen MS apologists stepping forward to explain how Microsoft only ever used Patents defensively and would never ever ever use them offensively?

Everyone who made that claim, go stand at the back of the class. You know who you are.