I assume they wanted to beat the suit to discourage patent trolls from going after Linux and Android in the future. That plan backfired. I'm guessing it backfired due to the jurisdiction...Google's team may have underestimated the ignorance of the court and overestimated their ability to educate.
This particular suit is a tiny chink in a big dam. But, enough of these little patent trolls, as well as a few heavy hitters like Oracle, going after Google could cause them (and other Linux distributors, as well) significant pain. Fighting every patent claim is the only sensible choice. If patent trolls know Google never rolls over, and they're going to have to litigate every single time (and lose a lot of the time), they may be more hesitant to go after Google, and may instead choose more compliant targets.
If I were in Google's shoes, I'd do the same thing.
It may be that acquisition would now be a reasonable response, though the price of the company just went way up because of this win...unfortunately, now their patent troll business model has been validated.
This particular suit is a tiny chink in a big dam. But, enough of these little patent trolls, as well as a few heavy hitters like Oracle, going after Google could cause them (and other Linux distributors, as well) significant pain. Fighting every patent claim is the only sensible choice. If patent trolls know Google never rolls over, and they're going to have to litigate every single time (and lose a lot of the time), they may be more hesitant to go after Google, and may instead choose more compliant targets.
If I were in Google's shoes, I'd do the same thing.
It may be that acquisition would now be a reasonable response, though the price of the company just went way up because of this win...unfortunately, now their patent troll business model has been validated.