Dennis Byron

Red Hat Settles Patent Lawsuit

I am trying to figure out the investment aspect of this move by Red Hat and admit I am struggling with for an opinion (which is why I didn't post one).

Of course, Red Hat says the settlement is not public information so we can't tell if money changed hands and, if so, in what direction. If Red Hat paid for these " precedent-setting rights," I am assuming it was a small amount given what this was about technically. My guess is that it paid.

However if Red Hat didn't have to pay (or even got the other guys to pick up legal fees), it's still small potatoes but it means more share-value-affecting posturing by Red Hat over IP philosophy, Open Standards (in upper case), and more of the "U.S. bashing is good for open source" stuff Red Hat's CEO apparently said in March--see www.ebizq.net/blogs/op...).

The argument for the "Red Hat won" scenario is a FAQ sheet that accompanied the press release which said "More generally, the settlement demonstrates Red Hat’s commitment to standing up for the community against patent aggressors. We believe it will serve as a precedent that should discourage future similar cases."

The plaintiffs don't look like patent agressors to me and the precedent that Red Hat is talking about is not a legal precedent as it implies but simply the idea that it is not just indemnifying itself but also those upstream and downstream in the development process.