The bitter legal tussle between business software maker Oracle Corp. and rival SAP over a jury's $1.3 billion copyright infringement verdict may be headed back to a trial court for more litigation.

That seemed to be the consensus of a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco that heard in the case on Tuesday.

A trial judge in 2011 called the verdict in favor of Oracle excessive and reduced it by about $1 billion.

Oracle appealed. The 9th Circuit judges said the case may need to go before another jury to calculate a new verdict.

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