Microsoft kicks off patent battle against TomTom

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Microsoft has revealed that it is suing Sat nav manufacturer TomTom for allegedly infringing on its patents.

The firm said that it had started legal action as it seeks to protect its intellectual property (IP) rights relating to the use of navigation technologies, in addition as file formats.

Talks over the issue have been going on for some time, almost a year in fact, however Microsoft seems to feel it has hit a wall as far as discussions can go, and sees legal action as the next step.

"When a reasonable business agreement cannot be reached, we have no choice but to pursue legal action to protect our innovations and our partners who licence them," said Horacio Gutierrez, deputy general counsel of Intellectual Property and Licensing at Microsoft.

Microsoft licences much of the technology in question, but there seems to be some issue over the way it is being used.

TomTom has so far denied that it has infringed on any of the patents in question, which relate to TomTom's use of GPS and the FAT file system, and has promised to fight its case to the fullest.

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