Salesforce.com CEO Marc Benioff Calls Microsoft “Patent Trolls” and “Alley Thugs”

Salesforce.com CEO Marc Benioff was on a conference call yesterday to report earnings. Benioff was asked about his thoughts on Microsoft’s lawsuit against them over patent. Benioff replied with the following:

The reality is that these patent trolls are unfortunately just part of doing business and technology these days. They’re basically the alley thugs. Every thriving economy has alley thugs and we do too. And that’s fine. You know?

Personally, I’m just disappointed to see this from a former leader of our industry, but it’s eminently resolvable and it’s not material to our day-to-day business. It’s basically a no-impact situation. It’s not something that I think anyone needs to make anything of.

[CNET]

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