Has Alcatel-Lucent accepted Microsoft 'loss'?

Judge Rudi Brewster said on August 6 that he had ruled out a first-instance court ruling that fined Microsoft $ 1.5 billion in damages for pirating Alcatel-Lucent-owned MP3 format technology.

The world's No. 1 software firm claims this is not a victory of its own but for all other technology firms facing the risk of Alcatel-Lucent suing piracy similar to Microsoft if the manufacturer France's victory.

'Today's ruling is a polite victory for both Microsoft and consumers of digital music products as well as hitting people's common perception of the copyright system,' said Brad Smith. Head of Microsoft's lawyers' team said.

In February, the San Diego federal court ruled that Microsoft had infringed technology copyright related to Alcatel-Lucent's MP3 audio file format and asked Microsoft to pay a compensation payment. $ 1.5 billion.

On July 25-26, the court held a re-trial of the case after Microsoft filed an appeal, requested a retrial or reduced the penalty for the company. After two days of trial Judge Rudi Brewster ruled that Microsoft did not violate copyright as what Alcatel-Lucent accused.

In the 43-page final ruling, Judge Brewster said Microsoft was granted a license to use technology from research organization Germany Fraunhofer Gesellschaft - the co-owner of the MP3 technology copyright.

' The previous ruling that Microsoft infringes on copyright has absolutely not enough evidence ,' said Brewster.

Alcatel-Lucent's spokeswoman, Mary Ward, said Judge Brewster's verdict was a "shock" to the firm and said it would take necessary actions to refute the ruling.

Microsoft said there would be no new trial unless Alcatel-Lucent appealed to the US Federal Court and succeeded in overturning the ruling. Even if this happens, the record $ 1.5 billion fine will no longer be preserved.

The legal 'battle' between Microsoft and Alcaltel-Lucent over the past time can be said to be very stressful. French network equipment manufacturers repeatedly sued Microsoft for violating their technology copyrights and demanding "record" compensation payments.

Hoang Dung