I found the article below on the bloomberg terminal.  Based on the last free write (#7), SAP is expanding its software to stay competitive in the cloud computing market.  However, they have found themselves in trouble with Oracle, a leading software company.  Oracle has sued SAP for infringement on licences they would have had to obtained from Oracle in order to use their new software.  SAP was forced to pay Oracle $777 million, which will certainly eat into their already shrinking profits.



Oracle Claims $777 Million Damages in SAP Infringement Case (1)


2012-05-02 20:17:12.746 GMT





(Updates with SAP damages estimate in fifth paragraph.)



By Joel Rosenblatt

May 2 (Bloomberg) -- Oracle Corp. said it will claim

damages of $776.7 million in its retrial of a copyright-

infringement lawsuit against SAP AG, the biggest maker of

business-management software.

Oracle decided in February to pursue a new trial rather

than accept U.S. District Judge Phyllis Hamilton’s reduction of

a 2010 jury verdict the company won from $1.3 billion to

$272 million. The retrial is scheduled for June 18 in Oakland,

California.

Oracle said in a court filing that it has a right to pursue

actual damages measured by the “fair market value of the rights

infringed.” To do so, the company has asked Hamilton, to let it

present evidence of a “hypothetical license” that would

establish that value. If not, Oracle said, it will pursue

damages based on $656 million in SAP’s profits and $120.7

million in Oracle’s lost profits, according to the April 26

filing.

Oracle said its damages claim will be supported at trial by

an “updated analysis and additional evidence to support the

infringers’ profits and lost profit amounts.”

“We think Oracle’s damage estimate is overstated,” Jim

Dever, a spokesman for Walldorf, Germany-based SAP, said in an

e-mail. SAP estimates damages at $28 million, he said.



Downloaded and Copied



Oracle, based in Redwood City, California, sued in 2007

after discovering that SAP’s software-maintenance unit had

downloaded and copied its software. SAP didn’t contest that it

was liable for the infringement by its TomorrowNow unit, which

the company closed in 2008.

The jury award of $1.3 billion was based on the value of a

hypothetical license that SAP would have needed to use Oracle’s

software. Hamilton threw out the verdict, calling it “grossly

excessive” and not supported by the evidence.

TomorrowNow pleaded guilty in September to U.S. charges of

unauthorized computer access and SAP paid the unit’s

$20 million fine.

The civil case is Oracle Corp. v. SAP AG, 07-1658, U.S.

District Court, Northern District of California (Oakland).



For Related News and Information:

Oracle news: ORCL US CN

SAP news: SAP GR CN

Top legal news: TLAW

Legal functions: BLAW



--With assistance from Karen Gullo in San Francisco. Editors:

Peter Blumberg, Michael Hytha



To contact the reporter on this story:

Joel Rosenblatt in San Francisco at +1-415-617-7129 or

jrosenblatt@bloomberg.net



To contact the editor responsible for this story:

Michael Hytha at +1-415-617-7137 or

mhytha@bloomberg.net