Google to bid $900m for Nortel patents
April 5, 2011
Google is preparing a bid of up to $900 million for legal patents to safeguard against potential future lawsuits over its Android ecosystem. The bid for Nortel’s patent holdings, which are expected to be auctioned in the US or Canada by the end of June.
The announcement was made via a post on Google’s official blog by Kent Walker, Google’s senior VP and general counsel.
“If successful, we hope this portfolio will not only create a disincentive for others to sue Google, but also help us, our partners and the open source community – which is integrally involved in projects like Android and Chrome – continue to innovate,” read the post.
The mobile indsutry has seen many high-level legal battles in the last year. These have included Nokia suing Apple in the UK, claiming its iOS products infringe its IP patents and Apple’s attempt to trademark the term ‘app store’ has been contested by Microsoft.
Walker went on to write: “Some of these lawsuits have been filed by people or companies that have never actually created anything; others are motivated by a desire to block competing products or profit from the success of a rival’s new technology.
“But as things stand today, one of a company’s best defenses against this kind of litigation is (ironically) to have a formidable patent portfolio, as this helps maintain your freedom to develop new products and services.”