Boies, Schiller & Flexner and Bingham McCutchen scored a partial win late last week for Oracle Corp. in its copyright battle with Rimini Street Inc., a smaller rival that offers low-cost support to Oracle customers. While Rimini is admitting defeat on some points, it said that ruling doesn’t fundamentally undermine its growing business model of third-party software support and maintenance.
In a 29-page ruling issued on Thursday, U.S. District Judge Larry Hicks in Las Vegas ruled that Rimini Street infringed Oracle’s copyrights in the course of offering support to users of Oracle’s PeopleSoft business management software. Hicks refused to grant Oracle summary judgment on some of its other copyright infringement claims, however, ruling that a jury ought to hear Rimini Street’s defenses.
