Tech

Google 'strongly disagrees' that it could owe Oracle more than $8 billion

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Larry Page
Alphabet CEO Larry Page  Reuters

Google objects to the sky-high sum that Oracle is claiming in the ongoing copyright lawsuit between the two companies. 

In Google's latest filing, the search giant says that its damages expert "strongly disagrees" with the assessment that it could owe Oracle "no less than $8.8 billion" for its use of certain parts of the programming language Java in its Android operating system. 

The next phase of the case is about to head to court. A jury will decide if Google had the right to use certain parts of Oracle's programming language, Java, for free, or if it owes Oracle damages for its use that has been going on for years. 

Google says that Dr. James Kearl, the damages expert that the court hired, came up with the "no less than $8.8 billion" value by taking Oracle's theory on how to calculate how much Google owed "at face value."

Kearl came up with that number based on a calculation of the amount of profits that Google earned as a result of Android, which Google doesn't report, but the company says that "several of [Kearl's] opinions on disgorgement are ungrounded in the facts of the case or based on improper analytical frameworks."

You can read the whole filing here:

 

 

 

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Jillian was most recently an enterprise technology editor based in San Francisco.  She started at Insider as an intern on the technology desk in 2013 and rose to a senior reporter position, covering Alphabet, Facebook, and ecommerce. After three years at the site, she left to spend time freelance writing abroad, before taking reporting positions at CNBC and then at Forbes, where she covered Alphabet, Silicon Valley culture, and artificial intelligence. She returned to Insider in March 2020 and worked on the enterprise technology desk until August 2021.  Jillian graduated from Syracuse University's S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications with a degree in magazine journalism and information management and technology.