According to a recent Securities and Exchange Commission filing by Timeline, Microsoft has agreed to pay the settlement amount within the next two weeks.
Timeline is an unusual company. On the one hand it purports to be a traditional software firm, developing Microsoft-based financial management and reporting technology. On the other, it specializes in commercializing a portfolio of patented technologies which it licenses to ISVs including Microsoft, Oracle, Business Objects, Hyperion Solutions, Group 1, Kana Software, and Lawson Software.
However, over the past decade Timeline has made it a habit to aggressively defend those patents in court against alleged infringements from vendors including Oracle, Clarus, and Sagent Technology. In doing so it has made a fair living from patent settlements rather than selling software.
In 2003 Timeline emerged victorious in case filed against Microsoft that pertained to a 1999 licensing agreement that restricts Microsoft’s ability to sublicense Timeline’s patented data warehouse and data mart design technology which is widely employed in its SQL Server database product.
