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By Mel Duvall
Microsoft has filed an emergency injunction against an appeals court decision that could force it to stop selling its popular Word application in October.
In an "emergency motion" filed Tuesday, Microsoft asked the Texas appeals court, which handed down the order a week ago, to halt the injunction and hear its appeal.
The world's largest software company was ordered last week to pay a small Toronto-based firm, i4i, $290 million for knowingly violating a patent held by the company and incorporating aspects of the company's technology into its Word 2003 and 2007 software. At the heart of the dispute is Microsoft's alleged use of "custom XML."
In its filing with the court, Microsoft argued i4i was not entitled to the injunction, which could result in millions of dollars of lost revenue. "It is undisputed that i4i does not have a product that could fill the gap left in the market by the injunction; rather, i4i's products run as add-ons to Word," Microsoft said in the motion. "The district court acknowledged the absence of future harm, but deemed it irrelevant, focusing instead on harm that i4i allegedly suffered years ago."
Microsoft said it is trying to remove the technology in dispute from its Word products, but if it cannot do so within the 60-day deadline imposed by the court, it would be forced to stop distributing Word in the U.S. market. Such an event would almost be unthinkable. "Already, Microsoft is expending enormous human and financial capital to make its best effort to comply with the district court's 60-day deadline," it said.
i4i officials said in a statement that they fully expected Microsoft to appeal the ruling, but that the court's order was "fair and correct." i4i chairman Loudon Owen said the company will continue to vigorously enforce its patent and the court judgment.
i4i bills itself as an expert in the area of offering solutions to XML, or extensible markup language, authoring in Word. Its customer base is heavily weighted to the life sciences sector, where companies use its products to author, verify, and manage product labeling requirements to Federal Drug Administration requirements. Clients like drugmakers Amgen, Merck & Co. and Bayer use the software to ensure customers get accurate and up-to-date information on their medicine labels.
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