It looks like Google has a serious lawsuit up its tailpipe. Skyhook Wireless, the company that develops technologies for determining the location of cell phones and similar devices, has filed a patent infringement and a tortious interference lawsuit against the search giant, claiming Google’s interference cost Skyhook tens of millions of dollars.
Skyhook Wireless developers technologies that rely on cell towers, WiFi access points and GPS to determine the location of cell phones and similar devices within 20-30 metres accuracy. Google offers similar functionality through Google Maps and Google Latitude, which it of course also integrates into Android.
And therein lies the problem. Skyhook claims that Motorola was supposed to use Skyhook’s XPS location technology starting April this year in its Android-based smartphones. When Google’s Android boss Andy Rubin got wind of this, he contacted Motorola’s co-CEO Sanjay Jha and issued a ‘stop-ship’ order for Motorola Android devices using Skyhook’s technologies, claiming that using Skyhook’s software would make the devices incompatible. These are all claims by Skyhook, of course.
“As none of these devices was preloaded with XPS software, as would have occurred but for Google’s interference, Skyhook lost millions of dollars in royalties provided under the Motorola Contract,” Skyhook claims. Skyhook claims that another unnamed company, believed to be Samsung, received a similar stop-ship order from Rubin.
In the patent infringement lawsuit, Skyhook claims Google violated four of its patents relating to location services. All this stuff is quite important to Skyhook, since the company already lost Apple as one of its customers, since Cupertino created its own rivalling technology.
I guess the key here is whether or not the stop-ship order thing is true, and on what it is based. I wouldn’t think Google has a monopoly in the device location determination market (nicely made up, huh?) or the smartphone business, so this could just as well be a simple case of competition.
Then again, Google is just a company, and it’s just as likely they have actually broken laws by pressuring Motorola into ditching Skyhook. We’ll have to wait and see.
Google have some sort of license agreement for all of the Google applications on an Android handset, like Maps, Gmail and the Market. I certainly don’t know what that agreement entails, but it may be that to use the Google Maps app, the handset manufacturor has to use Google’s location technology, and that by using Skyhook’s tech, Motorola may have been in violation of that. I could be entirely wrong though, we should wait for Google’s rebuttal to this.
Forcing a company to use your software under threat of withholding other software from them is a pretty clear violation of Section 2 of the Sherman Act (which is to say, it’s against the law).
Its not applicable. Simply put, google’s location application is a component of its other programs. Google’s license requires a vendor to maintain compatibility between googles apps if they are used. Google certainly can require motorola to either not ship a product that violates the license, or force motorola to not include googles apps.
This is well within googles rights.
A consumer can choose to switch this but a vendor cannot ship a product in violation of the license.
This wouldn’t violate that. It would still work across apps.
The license under which Google provides Android to an OEM cannot trump the law at least not in the United States.
(not yet anyway)
K
The clever thing is, though, that Motorola are free to use Android as they see fit. It’s the Google licensed applications, in this case specifically Maps, that are at issue. Motorola are more than free to publish a phone without them, but if they do, they have to abide by Google’s license agreement. If Motorola previously agreed, that trumps the law, if they had legal objections to any clause, then they should have addressed those prior to signing.
A better explanation, if Motorola agreed to provide Google Maps with Google’s locatin service, they have to do that. If they intended to use Skyhook, they should have negotiated a bit more with Google to remove Google’s location service from the agreement.
Edited 2010-09-17 03:12 UTC
Arm chair lawyers, represent!
I know, they are part of the world we live in, but…
Patent trolling is just the dark side of the software industry; far far from OS, programming language and technology stuff.
If any company is evil it’s Google. This is on top of their data mining of everyone’s info.
Compared to them, Apple is wonderful.
So, Thom, when are you going to call Google evil?
I’ve called Google evil a million times already.
All have sinned and fall short of the glory of Jobs.
When will people stop comparing companies together to determine their absolute evil/goodness. Just praise the good, and denounce the evil aspects. The least evil company shouldn’t get a free pass, nor should the least good company be forever condemned.
Skyhook have no claim, as competition is a good thing, and I would much rather have quality applications developed by google on my android than some third-party manufacturer who would probably add bloatware.
Plus, google is not evil if you have nothing to hide.
They can have all my information, sell it to advertisers, I do not care.
I consider it payment for all of their wonderful services.
Get out of here zombie.
Plus, google is not evil if you have nothing to hide.
Ah the old, lame “nothing to hide” excuse. Even if what you are doing is perfectly legal, it doesn’t follow that you want it to be public information. If you beg to differ, would you let me install a camera in your bedroom, woegjiub? I’d like to publish your facial expressions at the moment of climax during your lovemaking. If you’ve got nothing to hide, this shouldn’t meet any objections on your side.
Google is beginning to remind me of……. what’s that company called………the one that tried to take everyone else’s business, the one that wanted to dominant every tech business sector, the one that used its giant cash-flow from its core monopoly to undermine everyone’ else’s business by undercutting them, the one that used its monopoly power to intimidate the OEM’s to exclude its competitors…. what was it called? It’s name started with Micro – something?
Google is, for some reason, the darling for some people around here. The gentleness of this article about Google’s behaviour leading to this law suit is surprising. Google gives some stuff away free and is attacking the iPhone and Apple and I suppose that endears them to a lot of people. I think, given the principles that many people profess to have, that your affections are misplaced.
Skyhook Wireless, in their “complaint and jury demand†filed a document yesterday which covers Google’s control over which devices have access to the Android MarketGoogle and you can get the entire pdf here
http://daringfireball.net//misc/2010/09/Skyhook-Google%20Compla…
Here is an extract from the pdf
This article at Business Insider is worth a look
http://www.businessinsider.com/google-is-now-officially-evil-2010-9
Here is a quote from that article:
Here is another extract from the complaint against Google. Straight out of Microsoft’s old playbook. I suppose this too will be defended as championing openness.
…has beat the snot of Apple repeatedly and continuously for nearly two and a half decades? So now that Google/Android is taking over that role, they’ve become the new bogeyman for Apple apologists. How pathetically transparent.
So instead of a company that places draconian restrictions on carriers and handset makers, you prefer a company that pulls that sort of thing with end users and 3rd-party developers. Interesting, but not the least bit surprising.
But hey, since this kind news about Google is rare (while Apple is in the news for some new dickish move every other day), I guess you have to milk it for all it’s worth.
Teh Steve said that Google is their enemy, who are they to argue?
So rather than respond to Google’s actions, to condemn or support them, you shift the focus to Apple. What do you think about Google’s actions? Good or bad or don’t give a shit?
Oh please, you’re not fooling anyone. The implied point of your post was painfully obvious, all it’s missing is the part where you come right out and conclude:
“See? See? Google does not-nice things too! And that magically excuses all of Apple’s draconian BS! …at least if you don’t think about it too much.”
You still have nothing to say about Google’s actions then. Why is that?
I see you’re still using that as a way to dodge responding to any of the points I’ve posted.
And since you seem to be fond of “monkey see, monkey do” antics, allow me to add “Why is that?”
I don’t think it’s that simple.
Google Location service is just an API. I can’t seem to find it at the moment but there’s a whitepaper on qualcomm’s website that describe their location framework and explains that it implements the google location api. So evidently third parties can and do provide their own implementation thereof.
So regarding point 23, well, duh. They’re basically saying “everyone has to provide the same location api”, just like they generally have to provide the same api for about everything. It seems to me a bit like skyhook couldn’t or wouldn’t implement the android location api properly, which would undermine the android platform (APIs are supposed to be the same accross all devices, that’s kind of the entire point of an OS)
Note that if you don’t comply with the android compatibility definition (which can be found here: http://source.android.com/compatibility/index.html ) you can still use it and sell devices using it, you just can’t use the android trademark and connect to the android market. It seems fair that if it’s called “android” one would expect it to be able to run any android application.
Also:
This sounds innacurate. There’s no such application afaik. What there is is an API which allows OEMs to provide as many location providers as they want and applications to pick one that suits their needs and obtain data from it:
http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/location/index.html
It doesn’t seem an evil, google specific API to me. Of course it doesn’t mean google have not rejected their implementation in bad faith, but they don’t seem to portray things really fairly in their complain either.
Google might have to wait until noon until they can get that kind of money together!
There is an interesting Engadget article about the Skyhook Google conflict.
It’s here
http://www.engadget.com/2010/09/17/skyhook-google-forced-motorola-t…
Here is a short extract, its worth reading the whole thing.
[q]Now, this is Skyhook’s side of the story and we’re sure Google will make a persuasive argument of its own, but let’s just back up for a moment here and point out the obvious: Google’s never, ever come out and clearly said what’s required for devices to gain access to Android Market and the branded apps like Gmail — even though we’ve been directly asking about those requirements since Android first launched. Remember when Andy Rubin told us that there would be full-fledged “Google Experience” phones with no carrier or handset manufacturer limitations? Or when we were told that phones with skins like HTC Sense or additional features like Exchange integration wouldn’t have Google branding? And then all of that turned out to be a lie? Yes, Android might be “open” in the sense that the source code is available, but there’s no doubt Google’s wielded incredible power over the platform by restricting access to Market and its own apps — power that hasn’t been used to prevent carrier-mandated bloatware or poorly-done manufacturer skinning, but has instead apparently been used to block legitimate competitors like Skyhook from doing business. [/q}