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Microsoft Increases Android Patent Licensing Reach
BrianFagioli writes: Microsoft may not be winning in the mobile arena, but they're still making tons of money from those who are. Patent licensing agreements net the company billions each year from device makers like Samsung, Foxconn, and ZTE. Now, Microsoft has added another company to that list: Qisda Corp. They make a number of Android and Chrome-based devices under the Qisda brand and the BenQ brand, and now Microsoft will be making money off those, too.
What are the actual MS patents for which these Android companies are paying royalties? TFS and every one of TFAs don't say, don't even hint.
Look here?
I tried to make a more readable version of similar data on this wiki page:
http://en.swpat.org/wiki/Micro...
Help appreciated.
Help build the anti-software-patent wiki
For extraordinarily small values of probably. Lobbying is measured in millions, unlike the billions for research. And for whatever it's worth, Google spends more on lobbying than Microsoft does. Or anybody else.
Microsoft did the research and built the tech, anyone who doesn't want to pay royalties is free to fund their own R&D and develop their own technology.
Unlike copyrights, patents disregard provenance. This means that even someone who does fund his own research and development could end up independently reaching the same solutions* that Microsoft engineers reached. This would run the risk of having production shut down by Microsoft's legal department.
Again, vendors are free to develop their own technology, nothing stops them
One thing that stops them is the exclusive license granted by national radio regulators to cellular network operators. All cellular network operators holding substantial spectrum leases have chosen to require the use of patented protocols to communicate with their networks.
* "Same" here shall be interpreted in accordance with the doctrine of equivalents.