Apple's ongoing battle with Motorola over patent licensing has been thrown out of court.
Apple has been maintaining that the rate requested for Motorola (and therefore now Google's since the search giant bought out the handset developer) is too high and wanted a court to order a lower rate.
But District Judge Barbara Crabb of the Wisconsin federal court ruled that she does not have the legal authority to make the claims.
That said, Apple is still pursuing the case against Googorola in other US regions, with court dates set for next year to make sure it isn't liable to pay damages on devices which featue Qualcomm technology, which uses Motorola patents in its designs.
No Crabb-Apples this Christmas
The case being dismissed in Wisconsin is a blow to Apple however, as it was looking to force down the price Motorola is asking to use its essential technology – the company previously said it wouldn't pay more than $1 per handset.
Google, unsurprisingly, issued a statement filled with understated legal glee at the dismissal, claiming that it has always offered what it considers to be a fair price to Apple for the patents.
The bad news for the consumer is that there's no notion of these constant patent wars being settled as the battles continue to play out over many territories and over a number of issues.
The upshot could be higher handset prices, especially in the Android camp, as the likes of Microsoft and Apple attack the OS – hence the reason Google is so intent on leveraging the core assets it has, many of which live within the newly-acquired Motorola stable.
From Reuters and FOSS Patents
