HP's $325 million Resolves with EMC on Patent Disputes

The two companies stated that HP will purchase software from EMC for internal use or resale within the next five years. HP spokesman Ryan Donovan said the company is already using EMC's VMware and reselling the product to corporate customers. He said: "EMC will use some of our products and vice versa."

In 2000, EMC filed a lawsuit against StorageApps, a storage management company, claiming that the latter infringed EMC patents in the "mirroring" replication of system files. In 2001, StorageApps was acquired by HP, and the lawsuit naturally went to HP. In 2002, Hewlett-Packard filed a retaliatory lawsuit against EMC, saying EMC's Symmetrix, Clariion and TimeFinder products also infringed HP's patented technology. Shortly thereafter, HP filed a second lawsuit against EMC, and EMC conducted multiple counterclaims for this purpose. According to legal procedures, the series of lawsuits between the two companies will enter the trial stage later this year.

In May last year, HP lost the lawsuit when EMC sued StorageApps. The two companies said that the new agreement reached on Monday will end all previous patent disputes and stated that it will strengthen business cooperation in the future.