Microsoft Settlement
On April 3, 2004 , Intertrust and Microsoft settled their patent litigation with Microsoft taking a comprehensive license to Intertrust's patent portfolio for a one-time payment of $440 million.
Under the terms of the agreement, developers, including system integrators, may need a license from Intertrust for other uses of Microsoft technology. This includes cases in which Microsoft technology is combined with third-party technology.
History of the Microsoft Litigation
In April 2001, Intertrust initiated a lawsuit against Microsoft. The lawsuit ultimately accused Microsoft of infringing 11 of Intertrust's patents and almost 130 of the company's patent claims.
The lawsuit centered on accused products based on the following technologies:
- DRM and product activation technologies
- .NET and related security technologies
- Trusted and reliable operating system technologies
In bringing the patent infringement lawsuit, Intertrust believed that Microsoft's forward-going technology infrastructure significantly relied on Intertrust's inventions for DRM and trusted computing.
In July 2003, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California issued a ruling in Intertrust's favor, accepting Intertrust's claim constructions and denying a motion Microsoft had filed for summary judgment. This ruling paved the way for the eventual settlement of the lawsuit, with Microsoft taking a comprehensive license to Intertrust's patent portfolio for a one-time payment of $440 million on April 3, 2004.
http://www.intertrust.com/main/ip/settlement.html
