Supreme Court seek Obama administration views on Google-Oracle dispute
Attendees gather at the Android developer sandbox during the Google I/O Conference at Moscone Center in San Francisco, California June 28, 2012.
Credit: Reuters/Stephen Lam
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The Supreme Court on Monday asked the U.S. government to weigh in on whether the justices should hear a closely watched copyright dispute between Google Inc and Oracle Corp over software used to design Google’s Android smartphone operating system.
Oracle sued Google in 2010, claiming Google had improperly incorporated parts of its Java software into Android. Oracle is seeking roughly $1 billion on its copyright claims.
The nine justices will take no further action on the case until U.S. Solicitor General Donald Verrilli files court papers offering the views of President Barack Obama’s administration.
The court is weighing whether to review a May 2014 ruling in favor of Oracle by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. There is no deadline for the government to file its papers.
The case is Google Inc. v. Oracle Corp, U.S. Supreme Court, No. 14-410.
The justices also asked the Obama administration to weigh in on a second case involving Google over whether it will have to defend claims that its Street View mapping software violates patents held by Vederi LLC after the Supreme Court declined to take up the company’s appeal.
In March 2014, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit threw out a district judge’s finding that Google had not infringed on four different patents.
Vederi sued Google in 2010. The company says Google infringed on its patents, which concern ways of creating images of a geographical area that can be navigated by computer.
Street View is a product that enables users to navigate images of streets created from a series of photographic images taken by cameras positioned on top of cars.
The case is Google Inc. v. Vederi LLC, U.S. Supreme Court, No. 14-448.
(Reporting by Lawrence Hurley; Editing by Will Dunham)