After losing an appeal in a US federal court in a patent dispute battle with i4i last year, Microsoft now also announced that it is going to pay $200 million (over R1.5 billion) to VirnetX Holding Corporation as part of a settlement in another patent dispute battle.
 
VirnetX brought two patent infringement cases against Microsoft before the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas. According to TechSpot, VirnetX first filed a lawsuit against Microsoft back in 2007, claiming the software giant was using its virtual private networking (VPN) patents without paying. The list of Microsoft products named in this first suit includes Windows XP, Windows Vista as well as Server 2003. Microsoft’s Live Communications Server, Windows Messenger, Office Communicator and a few versions of Office were also mentioned. VirnetX won the first round in that case and also filed another lawsuit, claiming that Microsoft again infringed on its networking patents with its release of Windows 7 as well as Server 2008 R2. According to the terms of the settlement, both these lawsuits will be dismissed.
 
Besides the financial payment that Microsoft is making to VirnetX, no other details concerning the settlement were disclosed. “We are pleased to work with VirnetX to bring these cases to a successful resolution through this settlement,” said Tom Burt, corporate vice president and deputy general counsel for Microsoft Corporation. “We look forward to VirnetX’s continued progress as it develops its technologies.”