Late last year, an U.S. International Trade Commission judge ruled that Motorola had infringed upon on Microsoft patent related to "generating meeting requests and group scheduling from a mobile device." We noted at the time that the judge's decision would be subject to review by the full Commission, and today it decided to uphold that ruling, meaning that Motorola now faces an import ban on its infringing Android products. The exclusion order is now subject to a 60-day review by the president.
Both companies have issued statements on the news to All Things D. Microsoft is (unsurprisingly) pleased with the ITC's decision, saying that it hopes that Moto will be open to an agreement to license Microsoft's patents. Meanwhile, Motorola notes that it will still be able to ship devices during the aforementioned review period. Moto says that it plans to explore all of its options in regards to what it'll do in reaction to today's decision. The full statements from both companies can be found below:
Now we'll have to wait to see what Motorola decides to do in reaction to the ITC's decision. Moto mentioned that it'll consider appealing the ITC's decision, but it could also decide to alter its products to remove the infringing aspect of its devices. Another option would be to take Microsoft up on its offer of a patent licensing agreement like we've seen several other manufacturers do. It'll definitely be interesting to see exactly what path Motorola ends up taking, so keep it locked to PhoneDog for more.