Times have changed. These days, in order to sell a product, you need a massive patent portfolio to counter IP lawsuits from what has been negatively described as "patent trolls". Of course, the big tech companies have no issue with filing lawsuits against each other, even while they complain about patent lawsuits... or as I would say, Microsoft is a champion in the hypocrisy.
Turns out, Microsoft, Apple, Oracle and EMC formed CPTN Holdings to purchase Novell's IP portfolio. It was temporarily put on hold late last year, but last month it was refiled, and now the deal is very close to being completed. An April 12th deadline passed and the Department of Justice did not raise any objections. Come April 26, if the German equivalent FCO does not object, the sale can be finalized.
What's notable, is that Microsoft and Apple have proxy lawsuits against Google's Android, and Oracle has an ongoing lawsuit against Google over Java VM / Dalvik VM.
Well, Google's got to play catch up, so it has placed a $900M stalking horse bid for Nortel's patents. And I guess we'll see if the DOJ is really playing fair, or if it has some sort of bias against Google, eh?
But this whole deal points to the bigger issue: the DOJ and US government fail to recognize that companies like Apple and Microsoft are just as guilty for fueling their own IP lawsuits against other companies.
IP holding companies are being formed, not to increase innovation, but to pool patents together and file mass lawsuits while extracting royalties. MPEG-LA is a patent pool that has threatened Google's open VP8 video decoder. These companies do not actually create products, but simply file patent after patent with the USPTO, and upon earning a patent, start on their lawsuit trails.
If Google does not quickly get into the IP acquisition game, it'll soon find itself paying out royalties as quickly as it is earning advert dollars from its search sites. And therein is the problem: the cost of defensive measures will eventually increase everyone's costs...a veritable patent tax, if you will.
We should all be upset.
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