Legal disputes against Microsoft are costly and Immersion found this out the hard way: the company will have to pay the Windows maker $20.75 million in compensation for violating a settlement dating from 2003.
Immersion will make a one-time payment to Microsoft, which, in return, will enroll the company in its Certified Partner Program. No additional details have been disclosed.
"We are pleased to resolve our outstanding dispute with Microsoft and to put this litigation behind us," said Immersion president and CEO Clent Richardson. "We now have our full attention and focus devoted to working with innovative companies around the world, including Microsoft, to accelerate and rapidly achieve global adoption of our haptic technology in gaming, consumer electronics, mobility, and medical products."
The original story goes like this: Immersion, the force-feedback company, sued both Sony and Microsoft in 2002 for infringement of its patented force-feedback technology, which was used in both the PlayStation 2 and the Xbox console.
Microsoft and Immersion settled out of court one year later, and the Redmond company was promised the sum of $15 million should Immersion settle with Sony too. The settlement in question did take place in 2007, but Microsoft got nothing following the deal. So a new lawsuit was filed, getting Immersion to sign the recent agreement.
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