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2000 Caldera-Microsoft Settlement Surfaces in Novell v. Microsoft Antitrust Lawsuit

By Pamela Jones et al.

The Novell/Canopy/Caldera/DR DOS story continues, and Novell and Microsoft are in the middle of it all, battling in discovery in the Novell v. Microsoft antitrust litigation -- that is the litigation over WordPerfect currently before the US District Court in Maryland in pretrial discovery.

Microsoft politely asked for [PDF] all documents "relating to Novell's sale of PC operating systems claims to Caldera and Novell's involvement with Caldera's case against Microsoft", as well as "all documents produced by parties and third parties" in the Novell v. Canopy case.

Why? Because it is its theory, which it wants to do discovery to demonstrate, that Novell sold all its antitrust claims to Caldera, and that would kill off the two remaining claims Novell has brought against Microsoft in the antitrust case. Microsoft, not satisfied with what Novell produced or its reasons for refusing to produce some documents, brought a Motion to Compel Discovery [PDF] [Memorandum in Support (PDF)], and it has just been granted [PDF].

In Novell's opposition [PDF] to the motion, it attached some exhibits, one of which is the settlement agreement [PDF] in the Caldera v. Microsoft litigation, as Exhibit K.

Finally, we get to read it, all except the exact figure that Microsoft paid to Caldera. But Microsoft does say, in the memorandum in support, on page 9, that Novell got "tens of millions of dollars" from the settlement, and a transcript [PDF] of a hearing in the Caldera litigation hints strongly, on page 9, that Novell contracted to get 20% of any recovery, so you can get an idea of how large the settlement figure was that Canopy received. I know some of you have wondered if that success inspired Caldera to sue IBM to try to get lightning to strike twice. The exhibits are where all the history comes out.

Full post as published by Groklaw on September 06, 2008 (boomark / email).