Motorola Gets Favorable Ruling in Patent Infringement Case

by InvestorPlace Staff | April 24, 2012 10:00 am

[1]Motorola Mobility Holdings (NYSE:MMI[2]), which is being acquired by Google (NASDAQ:GOOG[3]), got a favorable ruling [4]on a patent infringement suit against Microsoft’s (NASDAQ:MSFT[5]) Xbox gaming platform.

The ruling came down from Judge David Shaw, who is part of the U.S. International Trade Commission. The litigation involved five patents, of which Shaw said Microsoft violated four, Reuters said. The case will go for a final ruling before the full commission at the ITC.

Keep in mind that a key reason Google wants Motorola is for its patent portfolio. In fact, it is likely to be a key tool in its fight for wireless dominance against players like Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL[6]). The Xbox suit involved patents on technologies like mobile connections to the Internet and video.

Interestingly enough, the patent wars may spread beyond mobile and move into other hot areas like social networking. Recently, Yahoo! (NASDAQ:YHOO[7]) sued Facebook for patent infringement — Facebook has countersued and is aggressively buying patents as well, including shelling out $550 million for patents that Microsoft recently purchased from AOL (NYSE:AOL[8]).

– Tom Taulli, InvestorPlace

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