Oracle Seeks $9.3 billion Lawsuit Against Google’s Use Of Java In Android

The long-running copyright lawsuit against Google by Oracle still continues. Oracle is seeking about US $9.3 billion in damages against Google over its use of Java in Android, court filings show.

Oracle sued Google six years ago, claiming the search giant needs a license to use parts of the Java platform in Google's market-leading mobile OS.

The companies went to trial over the matter in 2012 but the jury was split on the crucial question of whether Google’s use of Java was protected by "fair use," which permits copying under limited circumstances.

A new trial is due to begin May 9 in a federal district court in San Francisco. Oracle’s Larry Ellison and Google’s Eric Schmidt are expected as star witnesses to take the stand. 

The new trial will cover six additional versions of Android, including Lollipop.

Other issues in the case include; 

• Google's decision to use Java as the basis for its Android operating system without obtaining a license from Sun.
• How much Google should pay for its alleged infringement?

Google denies any wrongdoing. It says its use of Java is covered by fair use, which allows copying in limited cases. Factors include whether the use of the copyright work was transformative, meaning whether it turned it into something new; the amount of the original work that was copied, and the impact of the copying on the market value of the original work.

The first figure accounts for money Oracle might have made from licensing Java to handset makers itself, if Google hadn’t developed Android. The second is for profit Google made from Android, including from mobile advertising and apps and content sold through the Android Market and Google Play (Google’s parent company, Alphabet, made $4.9 billion in profit last quarter).

The two sides are due in court April 27 for a pretrial hearing before the judge.

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Source: pcworld