The lawsuit was filed by Business Objects in October 2001 and alleged that MicroStrategy had impinged on its jealously guarded semantic layer patent – a mapping technology for querying relational databases. Officials at McLean, Virginia-based MicroStrategy said the court’s summary judgment which dismisses Business Objects’ only outstanding claim in the lawsuit not only vindicates it from any wrong doing but also highlights its more sophisticated approach to generating queries.
The ruling cited substantial differences between the two companies’ products
Paris-based Business Objects had sought damages in excess of $100m.
Business Objects’ semantic layer patent, which provides a representation of databases using familiar business terms, was filed over a decade ago and has kept many US lawyers off the streets. MicroStrategy isn’t the first company that Business Objects has targeted. It has successfully filed similar patent suits against rivals like Cognos Inc and Brio Software Inc (since taken over Hyperion Solutions Corp).
Business Objects officials declined to comment on the court ruling yesterday. We don’t comment on ongoing litigations, a spokesman told Computerwire. MicroStrategy has also filed its own patent lawsuit against Business Objects which is expected to go to trial in May 2006.
The announcement came on the same day that MicroStrategy reported its second quarter results. The company’s profits surged 54% to $17.6m, with revenue also up a sprightly 31% to $65.4m. Separately MicroStrategy has also approved a $300m share buyback program spread over five years.
Shares of MicroStrategy shot up 13% in after hours session on Nasdaq to $8.57.
MicroStrategy certainly seems to be hitting the right market chords these days. IT research firm IDC has once again positioned the company as the fastest growing BI vendor for the second consecutive year. IDC’s Worldwide BI 2004 Vendor Shares report states that MicroStrategy grew its BI software license and maintenance revenue nearly 33% in 2004.
MicroStrategy is well respected in the BI market for its namesake scalable relational OLAP (ROLAP) platform. Its software has traditionally been used for complex analysis of large data sets. However the release of MicroStrategy 8 in February this year adds a more intuitive web interface to draw in more business mainstream business users.
