MSFT keeps winning in court.
Won against Bristol, Winning against SUN below, next will be a victory in appeals court, imo.
====
Sun's claim against Microsoft dismissed in pretrial ruling
By Bloomberg News
May 30, 2000, 3:00 p.m. PT
A U.S. judge tentatively denied Sun Microsystems' claim for $35 million in damages as part of the company's
breach-of-contract dispute with Microsoft.
The pretrial ruling by U.S. District Judge Ronald Whyte in San Jose, Calif., was issued May 25. At issue was whether Microsoft
should pay Sun after releasing a small portion of Sun's Java programming source code on Microsoft's Web site. The code was
made temporarily available in test releases of Microsoft's Software Development Kit for Java 2.0.
Microsoft, the world's largest software maker, and Sun, a leading maker of workstation
computers, have been embroiled in a fight over a 1996 agreement that gave Microsoft the
right to license Java from Sun. Microsoft claims the release was unintentional and the result of
an automated copying process performed by lower-level employees.
Sun "fails to raise a genuine issue of fact" as to whether an officer, director or general manager
at Microsoft purposely released the code, Whyte said. He invited both parties to make further
arguments in support of their claims.
Representatives of Sun couldn't immediately be reached for comment. The company is seeking
damages under a part of the agreement that's triggered when a high-level Microsoft executive
intentionally or willfully makes the source code available to the public. Sun claims it became
aware of Microsoft's alleged actions on at least three occasions in 1997 and 1998.
Whyte is expected to set a trial date for the case on Aug. 11, Microsoft spokesman Jim Cullinan
said. |
