Chinese PC maker Asus has jointly announced with IBM that the two parties have signed a cross-licensing agreement to enhance their cooperation and to end the protracted patent infringement dispute between the two.
The dispute between Asus and IBM started at the end of 2007 when IBM complained to the United States International Trade Commission and said that some of Asus' PC products and parts had infringed IBM's patents in electric power management and cluster computing. In April 2008, Asus also submitted a indictment to the U.S. court, saying that IBM had infringed two of its patents.
In March 2009, ITC acquitted Asus of the patent infringements, but IBM took an appeal, which was rejected at the beginning of October. After that, Asus and IBM announced that they have agreed to sign a patent cross-licensing agreement, ending all the ongoing patent lawsuits between the two.
The two companies did not reveal the license fees involved in this agreement.