Microsoft signs more Android patent agreements, this time with Quanta ~ GoAndroid

Thursday, October 13, 2011

Microsoft signs more Android patent agreements, this time with Quanta

11:10 PM

Simranpal SIngh

Microsoft is at it again, wasting no time signing deals covering royalties and patent agreements from everyone involved in the Android OEM business as of late. The latest to fall victim this time around is Quanta Computers. The name might not be widely known but Quanta is a huge manufacturer of electronic devices. They built the BlackBerry Playbook, the Kindle Fire, and have contracts with companies such as HP, Apple, Dell, Gateway, Lenovo, Sony and many others. Today have signed patent royalty agreements with Microsoft over any Android or Chrome products they intent to build now, and in the future.

For those unfamiliar with the situation, Microsoft has a wide array of patents regarding all sorts of mobile and computational devices, and software. All Android and Chrome based devices are susceptible to infringe on these patents and to cover their bases OEM’s have been forced into signing agreements with Microsoft. There is much more to this story but that is gist of it. This is nothing new and Microsoft has been banking around $5 USD from every HTC Android device sold, that deal alone and net them more profit than Windows Phone 7 as a whole lately. Velocity Micro, Onyko and many others have signed similar deals including another big name, Samsung.