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Oracle Aims for January Trial Against Google

(CN) - Google and Oracle are at odds as to whether January is too early to begin the trial that will determine whether Android phones infringe on Oracle's patented Java technology.

Oracle hopes to tie up the remaining pretrial disputes so the San Francisco court can schedule a trial for January, but Google is pushing for July.

The parties filed their joint timetable statement on Tuesday, along with opposing papers regarding an expert report that estimates the Android creator could owe more than $2 billion in damages if the court determines it infringed on Oracle's patented Java technology.

Oracle sued Google in August 2010, claiming that the Android phone violates Oracle's patent on their Java technology it acquired from Sun Microsystems.

U.S. District Judge William Alsup made his last adjustments to the report in question on Dec. 6.

Alsup characterized the report, authored by economics professor Dr. Iain Cockburn, as "speculative and unhelpful for calculating future damages on a claim-by-claim basis." He tentatively prohibited Cockburn from calculating future damages and referring to nonparty licenses and settlements in his report. The report had estimated that Oracle could collect about $1.5 billion for future 2012 royalties.

In Oracle's objection to Alsup's Dec. 6 order, attorney Steven Holtzman argued that Cockburn appropriately used the patents' and copyrights' contribution to Android to determine the value of a 2006 bundle.

"It is not necessary to directly value each component of the bundle or the full bundle to reach the reasonable conclusion that the value of Android is greater than or equal to the value of the bundle to Google," Holtzman wrote.

Oracle also argued that the jury, and not the court, should determine future damages. Cockburn has already provided a royalty calculation of a 10 percent revenue share and annual fee based on Android distribution, the 11-page filing states.

"There is no reason to preclude Prof. Cockburn from converting his damages formula into dollar figures or offering the opinion that it would be appropriate for Google to make running or periodic payments consistent with the royalty formula as applied until the date each patent expired," Holtzman wrote.

Google, on the other hand, wants Alsup to finalize the tentative order.

"Oracle does not deserve a third bite at the apple, because Dr. Cockburn's second report ignored the explicit direction set forth in this Court's July 22, 2011 order and - like his stricken first report - did so with the obvious intent of maximizing Oracle's damages recovery," Google attorney Robert Van Nest wrote in the response.

In the July order, Judge Alsup warned Oracle that "the next bite will be for keeps" and Cockburn's report would be excluded altogether if his report "fails to measure up in any substantial and unseverable way."

"Dr. Cockburn failed to offer any patent damages analysis at the claim level or any opinion about copyright damages purportedly resulting from Google's alleged literal copying of code files," Van Nest wrote.

"Dr. Cockburn deliberately chose to focus on larger figures for patent-by-patent damages and copyright damages relating to the 'structure and arrangement' of Sun's application programming interfaces," he continued.

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