The justices agreed to review the appeals
court ruling, and arguments are expected
early next year.
The first Android phone went on sale in 2008
and Google says more than 2 billion mobile
devices now use Android.
The dispute stretches back to 2010, when
Oracle filed suit over Google’s use of 11,500
lines of Java code. In the first of two trials, a
federal judge ruled that so-called “application
programming interfaces” (APIs) weren’t
protected by copyright.
After the appeals court overturned that
ruling, a jury found in a second trial
that Google had made “fair use” of the
programming code.
“There is nothing fair about taking a
copyrighted work verbatim and using it for
the same purpose and function as the
original in a competing platform,” Judge
Kathleen O’Malley of the U.S. Court of
Appeals for the Federal Circuit wrote in a
decision siding with Oracle.
Microsoft was among many parties that
urged the Supreme Court to upend
the appeals court ruling. The Trump
administration, responding to a request
from the court for its views, said the justices
should stay out of the case.
Google senior vice president Kent Walker
said the company is pleased the court will
hear the case. “Developers should be able to
create applications across platforms and not
be locked into one company’s software,”
Walker said.