The recent revelation that Microsoft makes a packet from Android might come as a surprise. But Android isn't the only competitor Microsoft makes money from – and more often than not, the competition is happy with the deal. Neither Apple nor Microsoft likes Android, and they both feel it infringes a number of their patents, but they're taking very different approaches to Android handset manufacturers. Apple is dragging HTC, Motorola and Samsung to court. At the same time, Microsoft has signed a licence deal with HTC and several other handset makers, is pursuing one with Samsung and spent over a year negotiating with Barnes and Noble, Foxcon and Inventec before turning to lawsuits and complaints to the ITC. For a company popularly seen as litigious, the legal action over the Nook ereader is only the seventh patent infringement suit Microsoft has ever brought – and some of those have ended in cross-licencing patent deals, like the deal with TomTom . Linux and more Indeed, Microsoft has licenced patents to over 700 partners, including Sony, Panasonic, Samsung (for a digital photo frame using technology from Windows Live Photo Gallery), Inrix, Volkswagen – and Linux (in the shape of Novell), as well as startups you probably haven't heard of (Zumobi, Zignals, Eon Realities and Wallop). Microsoft has even licensed technology to Apple and Google; the Exchange Active Sync protocol for getting email, contacts, appointments and tasks onto mobile phones (the iPhone and Google Sync use EAS)
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