Microsoft sues Motorola over Android phones

New York: Microsoft, the world's largest software company, filed patent-infringement claims targeting Motorola's Android smartphones, in the latest skirmish in the growing market for versatile mobile devices.

The nine patents relate to synchronising e-mail, calendars and contacts, scheduling meetings, and notifying applications of changes in signal strength and battery power.

Microsoft filed two complaints yesterday: one with the US International Trade Commission in Washington, which could ban US imports of the phones if a violation is found; and a second in federal court in Seattle in which Microsoft seeks unspecified cash compensation.

Microsoft, based in Redmond, Washington, is overhauling its mobile-phone operating system to Windows Phone 7 this year to stem market-share losses to Apple's iPhone and phones with Google's Android software.

Its Motorola dispute is part of a burgeoning battle over smartphones that includes Oracle suing Google and Apple fighting HTC Corporation and Nokia Oyj.

"There's a lot of patent lawsuits between handset vendors, and Motorola and Microsoft just add to the many already ongoing," said Tavis McCourt, an analyst with Morgan Keegan & Co in Nashville, Tennessee.

"It's a new industry and it's very unclear who owns the technologies; the products are moving faster than the intellectual property," he said.

The ITC complaint seeks to bar imports of the Motorola Droid 2, Droid X, i1, Cliq XT, Devour, Backflip, Charm and Cliq, along with associated software.

Potential countersuit

Microsoft in April signed a licensing agreement with Taiwan-based handset company HTC and said that it was demanding royalties from other makers of Android phones.

"We have a responsibility to our customers, partners and shareholders to safeguard the billions of dollars we invest each year," Horacio Gutierrez, Microsoft's deputy general counsel for intellectual property and licensing, said in a statement.

He added in a blog posting that the "Microsoft innovations at issue in this case help make smartphones ‘smart'."

Motorola, based in Schaumburg, Illinois, said it hadn't seen the complaint, and wouldn't comment on the details.

"Motorola has a leading intellectual property portfolio, one of the strongest in the industry," the company said in an e-mail. Motorola said it will "vigorously defend itself."

"You can expect Motorola to countersue on radio patents," McCourt said.

"Big picture from an investor perspective, these lawsuits rarely have a material impact and if they do, it's many years later."