Microsoft to pay Alcatel-Lucent $1.52 billion in patent suit damages
New York: A U.S. federal jury held Microsoft Corp. guilty of infringement of audio patents held by Alcatel-Lucent and ordered the software company to pay $1.52 billion in damages.

Microsoft said it plans to appeal if necessary. It said the verdict is unsupported by the law and that it had already licensed the technology in question from Germany's Fraunhofer.

Alcatel-Lucent had accused the world's biggest software maker of infringing patents related to standards used for playing MP3 digital music files.

For Microsoft, $1.52 billion represents six weeks of cash flow or about 15 cents per share.
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Siemens acquisition of UGS gets U.S. antitrust approval
Washington: U.S. antitrust authorities have approved plans by German group Siemens AG to buy industrial design software maker UGS Corp. for $3.5 billion.

UGS is owned by three private equity firms -- Bain Capital, Silver Lake Partners and Warburg Pincus, which bought UGS from technology services provider Electronic Data Systems in March 2004 for $2.05 billion.
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