There are undoubtedly hundreds of thousands of workaholics breathing easier tonight on the news that the RIM-NTP patent blood feud has been settled for about 50% more than the originally agreed settlement. I’ll have more later, but on first blush the deal looks like a bargain for RIM and a windfall for NTP.
There are certainly those who are not cheering the settlement. They would include competitors Visto, Good Technology and Palm, plus all those IT directors who already jumped from the Blackberry platform. Many of them will face pressure from their users to jump back.
OTOH, there are more than a few Blackberry-based devices which are ready for launch, just waiting in the wings for this suit to be over. Can you say Nokia, Sony Ericsson, Motorola and a few gadgets from the other side of the international date line?