Google Buys 1,030 Patents; Hopes to Fend Off Lawsuits

Google acquired over 1,030 IBM patents in mid-July, as it readies itself for a potential onslaught of lawsuits.

The acquisition, first reported by SEO by the Sea, includes patents on micro processing chip fabrication and design, servers and routers, as well as object oriented programming, and relational databases.

"Like many tech companies, at times we'll acquire patents that are relevant to our business," a Google spokesman said in a statement.

The terms of the deal were not released, but the motivation behind the deal is quite clear. As the technology arms race continues to get more intense, lawsuits over technology continue to rise.

This has forced some companies to start protecting themselves against lawsuits by loading up on patents. Microsoft and Apple recently teamed up to buy 6,000 Nortel patents, outbidding Google in the process.

"The tech world has recently seen an explosion in patent litigation, often involving low-quality software patents, which threatens to stifle innovation," Kent Walker, general counsel for Google, said. "Some of these lawsuits have been filed by people or companies that have never actually created anything; others are motivated by a desire to block competing products or profit from the success of a rival's new technology."

HTC, maker of popular Google Android phones, is currently embroiled in lawsuit negotiations with Apple over patents. It's speculated that this purchase could help to protect its Android operating system, but details are still not fully known.

A recent International Trade Commission ruling stated that HTC violated two of Apple's patents, causing speculation that the entire Android operating system might be in trouble.

The patent system should reward those who create the most useful innovations for society, not those who stake bogus claims or file dubious lawsuits," Walker said in response. " It's for these reasons that Google has long argued in favor of real patent reform, which we believe will benefit users and the U.S. economy as a whole"

Despite the company's stance on patents, it's believed that the company is also pursuing InterDigital Inc., a company that owns and licenses thousands of patents. The company doesn't produce any products, but could offer Google additional protection against lawsuits.

A deal for InterDigital could cost billions of dollars, but that doesn't figure to be too much of an issue for the Mountain View-based company. It has over $40 billion cash on hand, allowing for it to make costly acquisitions rather easily.