Oracle vs Google: records requested compensation from 9.3 billion

Over 9 billion dollars. This is the Oracle request for damages received from the use, considered improper, the Java development suite from Google to build Android. The Mountain View company is accused of copyright infringement for using 37 Java API packages to create his lucky Android mobile operating system. The damage amounts to be exact to 9.3 billion dollars, as we read of a document issued last week.

The claim for damages is huge not only when compared to the value of the API packages involved in the process between the two parties, but it is also much higher than the entire amount invested by Oracle to acquire Sun Microsystems in 2009, amounting to $ 5.6 billion. The damages claimed by Oracle are high flow even for a giant like Google: Alphabet in comparison, the company that controls the company of Mountain View, earned last quarter of less than $ 5 billion.

If Oracle succeeded in the coup it would be the largest financial penalty ever obtained in a process for copyright. It would be even higher than the $ 1.3 billion achieved by Oracle during the trial against SAP in 2010, worth at that time was declared as part of the largest judgment ever. The final amount was assessed on the basis of the revenues obtained from Google with the business of Android devices.

James Malackowski, expert hired by Oracle, inferred the huge sum not so much by analyzing the direct, less than 500 million, but especially those caused by a mechanism called "platform support", based on "weighted analysis of what Google pays to other companies for the contribution of their non-Android mobile platforms in connection with the generation of advertising revenues ", about 36% of the value of mobile advertising.

According to Oracle expert should get 100% of the "Platform support", about 8.8 billion: "Google faced a highly competitive landscape with a small window of opportunity," reads the report. "Java represented a significant portion of the market at the time, and Google has openly capitalized on that familiarity and comfort with an audience of carriers and OEM very important". There are of course the same view Google experts.

According to the Mountain View company, Oracle should not require more than $ 100 million in damages, an enormously lower figure than what he hopes to achieve. That figure is based on a speculation reported by the US press since the Google analysis I am not yet officially available.

The demand for Oracle's damage is part of the process according to Google's damage on the front of copyright infringement. The first subpoena came in 2010, the process two years later with the jury took sides in favor of Google on the issue of patents, but divided regarding the copyright. The case seemed closed with a Google win on all fronts, with US District Judge William Alsup ruled that the APIs that could not be protected by the laws on copyright.

Was opposed to the decision, the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, canceling the Alsup verdict on the issue of copyright. The higher court did not establish if Google had violated copyright laws, but simply resubmitted the case back to Alsup in order to be able to decide the lawfulness of the API from Google. According to Oracle, Google hastened to enter the market to anticipate potential competitors and had chosen Java for the large number of developers who already know the language.

For its part, Google claimed to have made a lawful use of the Java development platform, which allows the copy of the code in specific cases. Google also noted that the 37 Java APIs used are "an infinitesimal fraction of the Android platform" Code: "Oracle and Malackowski have improperly equated the value of Android, as a whole, with the value of 37 API", were the words lawyers company in Mountain View. The two sides are called upon to attend a court hearing on April 27th to discuss the case.