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Google claimed in a formal complaint with the European Commission recently that Microsoft and Nokia conspired to use their patents against competitors.
“Nokia and Microsoft are colluding to raise the costs of mobile devices for consumers, creating patent trolls that side-step promises both companies have made,” said Google in a statement to The Wall Street Journal, while Microsoft deemed the search engine’s filing as a “desperate tactic.”
According to the filing, Microsoft and Nokia entered agreements that allow Mosaid Technologies Inc. to legally enforce patents and share the outcome’s revenue. Reuters further specified that the two collaborating companies moved 1,200 patents to Mosaid.
Google called Mosaid a “patent troll” for holding patents and litigating hawkishly, and then it described its filing as a “pre-emptive measure against a developing legal hazard for Android partners.” In a nutshell: Google’s “legal hazard” concerns if smartphone manufacturers begin to view Android as a legal danger, they may decide to do business with Microsoft and Nokia instead.
“Google is complaining about antitrust in the smartphone industry when it controls more than 95 percent of mobile search and advertising,” added Microsoft in an emailed statement to The Wall Street Journal.
Earlier this month, Joaquin Almunia, the European Union’s vice president of the European Commission responsible for competition, sent a letter to Google’s chairperson Eric Schmidt. The letter detailed the findings of an antitrust investigation into Google’s search practices, and it offered the search engine a chance to remedy its “abuses” by settling. The offer is the first inkling at a possible conclusion to an antitrust investigation that launched in November 2010 to decide whether Google used its search supremacy to control competition in the marketplace.
Microsoft lastly indicated to The Wall Street Journal yesterday that it is hypocritical for Google to complain about patents when regulators and officials from around the world are concerned with the Mountain View, Calif.-based Company’s abuse of standard-essential patents.
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