Late Friday, Microsoft responded to the letter brief filed by Motorola last week in the parties’  RAND breach of contract case.  In its responsive letter brief [LINK], Microsoft disputes Motorola’s versions of the facts, and contends that Motorola has long known about the bases on which Microsoft would be seeking damages for breach of contract.  In particular, Microsoft claims that Motorola has known for over a year that Microsoft would be seeking to recover the costs of moving its EMEA distribution center from Germany to the Netherlands.  Microsoft suggests that Motorola’s efforts to limit Microsoft’s damages theories are nothing but a pretext for Motorola to actually dismiss Microsoft’s claims for damages for breach of contract.

In arguing that it should not be precluded from presenting its damages theories, Microsoft presents a detailed timeline of the events surrounding damages-related disclosures and discovery — we’ll let you read Microsoft’s letter brief to get the nitty-gritty details and just give you some of the high points below.

Microsoft claims that Motorola knew Microsoft would be relying on the relocation costs as early as May 2012, and that the parties and the court agreed to delay damages-related discovery until after the conclusion of the November 2012 RAND royalty-setting trial.  Thus, Microsoft asserts that any delays in its damages-related discovery are “substantially justified.”

Microsoft also argues that it timely disclosed additional detail regarding its damages theories in late March 2013 under the court’s recent scheduling order, and that Motorola waited unreasonably long before filing its letter brief.  Lastly, Microsoft claims that in any event, the timing of these additional disclosures are harmless and that any additional depositions requested by Motorola are unwarranted.