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BY JIM FLINK

You're watching multisource business news analysis from Newsy.

Bust out the pocket protector.  Throw down the slide ruler.
A tech fight’s brewing.
And Android -- is going all -- sub-human on its competitors.
The fight?  Over patents.
Here’s Google’s David Drummond -- in his own words -- on Google’s blog.

“Android’s success has yielded something else: a hostile, organized campaign against Android by Microsoft, Oracle, Apple and other companies, waged through bogus patents.
They’re doing this by banding together to acquire Novell’s old patents and Nortel’s old patents, to make sure Google didn’t get them… This anti-competitive strategy is … escalating the cost of patents way beyond what they’re really worth.”

So what has caused the little green Android -- to turn so blustery red?
An analyst tells Bloomberg -- Google just figured out -- it’s losing the significant patent war.

“The big disadvantage with Google is that they didn’t get into this space until 2008.  They were late comers.  They were latecomers because they saw huge significance in this space.  So they don’t have many patents.  They have less than 400 patents.  Compared to these other tech giants who have been in this space for years, who have been amassing patents in this space.  In some cases over 4000.”

Google has been playing catch up -- recently purchasing a thousand IBM patents -- but only after its competitors had snatched up six times that many from Novell and Nortel.  Financial News Network explains the jockeying now going on.

“Google’s desire to acquire is likely due to the belief that the company’s wireless patent portfolio is generally moderately weak by comparison to those of its competitors which has helped a range of companies take aim at Google and its Android operating system.”

So legitimate beef?  Or -- whiny and weak?
Microsoft isn’t holding back.  Fierce Mobile has Microsoft general counsel Brad Smith’s tweet....

"Google says we bought Novell patents to keep them from Google... Really? We asked them to bid jointly with us. They said no."

Fact check -- Google made a competitive bid -- $3 billion bid for those patents -- and lost.  So, Techie Buzz asks -- does Google’s left hand even know what its right hand is doing?

“Why would you first say that you don’t want to be a part of the team and then accuse the team of not playing fair? They asked you to join, you declined, your loss.”

Google is hardly losing.
Android devices are exploding -- but Read Write Web notes -- nothing could throw a wrench into the gargantuan Google juggernaut -- more than having to pay for patents.

“...if the cost of licensing becomes prohibitive to cash-strapped hardware manufacturers, that market will dry up quickly, and the profits for Android software developers will go right along with it.”

And while there’s plenty of criticism for Google, Business Insider comes to its defense, saying, this patent fight -- is exactly what Google calls it -- an arena where patent trolls are running amok.

“It is lame that everyone in the smartphone industry is suing each other using old, silly patents that have little or nothing to do with recent innovation, to try to wring out settlements and drive up the costs of doing business.  I hope Google’s lawyers will be doing a lot more about this than just blogging.”

By its own estimates, Google says some smartphones could have as many as 250,000 patent claims.
 

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