German court rules in Motorola's favour in Apple patent row
Motorola scored a victory in a patent war with rival Apple Friday when a German court upheld a decision banning it from offering services for syncrhonising e-mails on its devices in Germany.
The Mannheim regional court found that Apple's iCloud and MobileMe services breached the patents on the technology held by Motorola Mobility and it ordered Apple to pay damages to Motorola, but did not specify the amount.
The ruling marks a victory in a series of bitter patent war between various technology giants.
Earlier this month, European regulators opened two antitrust investigations against Motorola Mobility, bought by US Internet giant Google.
The European Commission said it would check whether Motorola had abused a dominant market position on patents by seeking injunctions to stop Apple and Microsoft from selling their iPhone, iPad, Xbox and Windows products.
Microsoft and Apple accuse Motorola Mobility of unfairly using its extensive patent portfolio to try to block competing products through court orders across the EU and by charging excessive licensing prices for essential patents.
(c) 2012 AFP
