Posted by : trraju on Dec 04, 2003 - 11:22 AM Microsoft

Microsoft plans to expand access to its proprietary technology, making some of its 4,000 patents available for licensing to other companies. Taking a cue from companies like Intel, Hewlett-Packard and IBM, Microsoft said Wednesday that it will begin to standardize the way it licenses its closely-guarded technology. In the past, Microsoft provided licenses to only certain companies on an individual basis.
Microsoft said it will begin to make its technologies available at "fair and reasonable terms" to any company, and royalty-free to academic institutions.

Competitors have complained for years about Microsoft's failure to provide technical information to ensure their products work smoothly with Microsoft's dominant Windows operating system. Those complaints are at the heart of ongoing antitrust complaints against Microsoft in Europe.

The new program is not directly related to the antitrust case, Microsoft said, and the company does not plan to expand access to its communications protocols, or technical information needed for making other companies' products work with Windows.

Under its antitrust settlement with the U.S. Justice Department, Microsoft was required to provide communications protocols to rivals.

"Over the last year we had requests from a number of companies in the IT industry to clarify our IP licensing policy and provide more information about it," said Microsoft General Counsel Brad Smith in a conference call Wednesday. Smith added that he didn't expect the new program to have a material impact on Microsoft's revenues, but rather to facilitate cooperation with other technology companies.

"We will help create new opportunities for increased collaboration," he said. "Others have licensed their IP for years. We're joining their ranks today."

The first technologies Microsoft will make available for license are its ClearType text display technology and its File Allocation Table (FAT) file storage system.

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