Microsoft's latest smartphone patent agreement is with Luna Mobile

By John Callaham
published

Microsoft logo
Microsoft logo (Image credit: Windows Central)

Microsoft has signed off on another patent agreement with an Android smartphone and tablet maker, Luna Mobile. The deal will allow Microsoft to receive royalties from the sales of Luna's devices.

Luna Mobile is based in Tampa, Florida and plans to launch a number of new smartphones and other products later this year that will be covered under the new patent agreement with Microsoft (opens in new tab):

"We are very happy to partner with Microsoft, a worldwide leader in the mobile and tablet experience," said Todd Walker, CEO and president of Luna Mobile. "When we launch later this year, we look forward to providing distributors and consumers with the best and most cost-effective mobile devices and technology currently available. Collaboration with companies like Microsoft has helped tum our vision into a reality."

As usual, the specific financial terms of this agreement were not disclosed.

John Callaham
John Callaham
36 Comments
  • Cool... Hope mobile is low cost continuum capable
  • It's not a Windows Mobile phone.
  • Microsoft receives royalties from almost all Android phone makers due to their patent licensing.
  • The word android is literally in the first sentence.
  • Ahhhh brain dead moment from me then, thought it sounded to good, that an Android manufacturer is now working to produce MS based products, that's how I quickly read it :D
  • Bravo!
  • Maybe one of their models is gonna be a Windows one
  • Agreed, Stranger things have happened...
  • Luna has 4 really good looking phones from what the website shows, I can't wait to see a couple of windows versions.
  • Yeah not bad.
  • As usual, Microsoft has not added a partner to make windows phones, but added another OEM that intends on making another Android phone strengthening Android strange hold in the smartphone market. For someone who is so smart, Satya sure does seen dumb. As I stated before, he should take all of these royalties from Android and apply them to helping make windows phone successful. In the end, he'll be the reason chrome books overtake windows once Google unified it's OS like windows 10 is attempting to do.
  • Yeah he "sure does seen dumb" making arrangments in one of the company's most profitable endeavors: patent royalties, instead of throwing money away in one of its biggest failures: Windows phones.
  • Yeah, what an idiot -- unlike all the CEOs here.
  • As usual, you haven't a clue what this is about. This is a company that is going to ship an Android device. They will be violating Microsoft patents. So like other Android makers, Microsoft is licensing their patents to these companies and making money off of them. It is either Microsoft licenses to them now, or take them to court later to get royalties from this company. It is not Microsoft doing something to not promote Windows Phone, it is them getting their licensing money from companies that sell Android.
  • Wow, your reading comprehension is.. abysmal.  
  • Wrong. Again.
  • Mmhmm, I don't even think *you* know what you're saying. Just being an obsessive twit.
  • I wonder if you have yet to realise you answered the wrong person or are just being a troll on purpose... Posted via the Windows Central App for Android
  • Except MS is required by law to license their patents, MS can't say no to licensing fair use patents. Therefore they choose to do these lucrative patent agreements instead of just a patent licensing scheme
  • So Microsoft can't see any success in making Android potentially better through another company? We already know what is happening with W10M devices, they're focusing on Enterprise and that's plainly just it. I don't see a reason to view this as a negative patent agreement, see Microsoft is primarily services and software over hardware. I want to see what they do with hardware like anyone else, but let's remember their core focus... EDIT: in case anyone wants to twist my words around, yes, they COULD make Windows Phones. I am just trying to remain neutral here.
  • Google Chrome Books will never overtake Windows in the PC market buddy.
  • evernote
  • Will they be producing devices with windows
  • Just because Luna only makes android devices NOW doesn't mean that in the future they won't make Windows 10 devices. I resent the previous statements making it seem like Luna will only ever make Android devices.
  • Don't be autistic, windows phone is gone, solid gone!!! Sayonara, arrivederci, auf wiedersehen! Posted via the Windows Central App for Android
  • There's always one in the comments...
  • Autistic? What the heck? You have no choice whether you have autism or not...
  • Right, tell that to everyone on tumblr.
  • ?
  • Trolls using the word "autistic" like people used to use the word "retarded". Making fun of people with autism IS NOT FUNNY!
  • You Americans should try and stop with that politically correct bullsh*t around the user of words. Calling someone retard or autistic is not making fun of people with disabilities. It's meant as an insult, saying that person is not of sound mind or speaking nonsense.
    Nothing else. Ohhh using the words "retard" and "autistic" etc as insults, hurts your oversensitive feelings? Tough luck. Get used to it. Or, indeed, go complain to Tumblr alongside the other moronic feminazis and SJW's. Sorry if I vented but few things p*ss me off as much as American Linguistic Censorship.
  • So you believe everything you see/hear ok tumblr?.... Down vote me all you want
  • I think it was a typo. They might have meant altruistic?
  • It is a licensing agreement for Microsoft's FAT file system. If Luna wants to use SD cards in their mobile phones, they need this license. Even for any Android phone that will plug into a Windows PC, and have the file system readable by Windows, this license is needed.
  • Microsoft is out of their brains ... Before they were against android and nw they are helping android ..... Nw whats their moto ?
  • Oh I dunno to be a SOFTWARE AND SERVICES COMPANY like their primary focus always was?