Microsoft Word Sales Illegal after Jan 2010

Appeals court banned Microsoft from selling Word if it uses patented XML

In 2007, i4i, a small Canadian company which owns a patent on the XML system used in MS Word 2003 and 2007, filed suit against Microsoft for infringing patent rights. After two years, Microsoft has apparently exhausted its appeals, as on Tuesday 12/22/2009, a Federal Judge upheld the judgment against Microsoft. The case is “i4i Limited Partnership and Infrastructures for Information Inc v. Microsoft Corp, an appeal from the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas in case no. 07-CV-113.” The judgment was for $290 million and Microsoft is forbidden to sell Word 2003 and 2007 after January 11, 2010. Both Word2003 and Word2007 use the i4i’s patented XML to store some aspects of documents.