Microsoft has achieved a ban on the import of Motorola smartphones and tablets in the US

The US International Trade Commission (ITC) presented Microsoft with a significant patent victory this Friday, banning the import of Motorola smartphones and tablets in the United States.

The ban , which was first reported by Foss Patents , is the result of ITC's December decision to violate Microsoft’s patent 6370566 owned by Microsoft by Motorola on “creating meeting requests and group schedules on a mobile device.”

In essence, Microsoft owns a patent for the ability to “schedule a meeting request from a mobile device” through the request designation, or “object”, “a global identification number that provides a unique identification of the object for other devices meeting the object”.

The Obama administration has 60 days to review an ITC decision. If the government does not reject the decision to ban, it will enter into force after the sixty-day period. Motorola can bypass the ban by removing the patented feature from its devices or entering into a patent license agreement with Microsoft, as other major Android device manufacturers have already done, including Samsung, LG and HTC.
But, as HTC has already found out , changes in software will still not save them from delays in deliveries, since government officials are now checking their devices to make sure they are patent-free.
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The six-person ITC also imposed a 33-cent penalty on each Android device Motorola imported during the sixty-day review period.

Microsoft says they tried to make an agreement with Motorola before filing a complaint with the ITC, and are still ready to agree:
"Microsoft filed a complaint against Motorola at ITC only after Motorola refused to renew the patent license for a year," said David Howard, a representative of the general council and vice president of Microsoft. “We are pleased that the Commission has recognized the violation of Motorola’s Microsoft intellectual property, and we hope that Motorola will join the vast majority of manufacturers of Android devices in the US by purchasing a license for our patents.”

Motorola Comment :
“Microsoft put forward 9 patents against Motorola. Although we are disappointed with the Commission’s decision on the violation of one of the patents by some Motorola devices, we intend to fully understand this and understand the reasons for this decision. Motorola Mobility will not suffer a strike in the near future, as the penalty for the next 60 days of Presidential review is 33 cents per device. We will consider all available options, including the appeal. "