Heinz-Jürgen Oertel
Manager of port GmbH

We are concerned that not only patents are being applied for all network layers (e.g. Microsoft patents on IPV6), but also that enforcement is becoming more aggressive (e.g. the German Teles litigation in the VoIP field). In recent years, customers have been asking more and more for Open Solutions. Open Solutions are not compatible with permanent monopolies on quasi standards. Neither customers nor we are willing to contract license fees for standard technologies. Monopolies generated by software patents impede competition and innovation. To include patent licensing negotiations into each customer project would make us more expensive towards our customers, and that would rather lead to new technologies no longer being implementable in Europe.