VMware 2009 Annual Report Download - page 13

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Table of Contents
additional charge. Many of our current and future competitors have longer operating histories, greater name recognition, a larger customer base,
and significantly greater financial, technical, sales and marketing, and other resources than we do.
Overall however, we believe our market leadership, large customer base, strong partner network, broad and innovative solutions suite, and
platform-agnostic approach position us to compete effectively for the foreseeable future.
Intellectual Property
As of December 31, 2009, the United States Patent and Trademark Office has issued us 63 patents covering various aspects of our server
virtualization and other technologies. The granted United States patents will expire beginning in 2018, with the last patent expiring in 2028. We
also have numerous pending United States provisional and non-provisional patent applications, and numerous pending foreign and international
patent applications, that cover other aspects of our virtualization and other technologies.
We have been issued trademark registrations in the United States, the European Community and Japan covering the trademarks VMWARE
for use in connection with computer software, clothing and reference materials, and VMWORLD for use in connection with educational
seminars. VMWARE also is our registered trademark in Australia, Canada, China, India, Israel, the Republic of Korea, Mexico, Singapore and
Taiwan. VMWARE FUSION is registered in Australia, Canada, China, the European Community, New Zealand, the Russian Federation, the
Republic of Korea, the United States, Hong Kong and Japan. VMMARK is registered in the European Community, Israel, the Russian
Federation and Japan. We also have trademark applications pending to register the VMMARK mark in the United States, China, and India. In
addition, we have registered trademarks for GSX SERVER and P2V in the United States and for MULTIPLEWORLDS in Japan. VMWARE
VSPHERE is registered in Austria, Australia and the European Community and pending to register in Canada, China, India, Japan and the
United States. We also have trademark applications pending to register the VMWARE VCLOUD mark in the United States and European
Community, a trademark registration for the mark ESX in the United States, a trademark registration for the mark VMSAFE in the United States,
a trademark registration for the mark VMOTION in the United States and a trademark registration for the mark COVALENT in the United
States.
Trademark registrations have been granted for the SPRINGSOURCE mark in Australia, the United States and the European Community
and for the SPRINGSOURCE mark and logo in the United States and European Community. Trademark registrations have been granted for the
HYPERIC mark and design in the European Community, Norway, Switzerland and the United States and for the HYPERIC HQ mark and design
in the United States.
We also rely on intellectual property protections such as copyrights and trade secrets.
Despite our efforts, the steps we have taken to protect our proprietary rights may not be adequate to preclude misappropriation of our
proprietary information or infringement of our intellectual property rights, and our ability to police such misappropriation or infringement is
uncertain, particularly in countries outside of the United States. United States patent filings are intended to provide the holder with a right to
exclude others from making, using, selling, or importing in the United States the inventions covered by the claims of granted patents. Our
granted United States patents, and any future patents (to the extent they are issued), may be contested, circumvented, or invalidated in the future.
Moreover, the rights granted under any issued patents may not provide us with proprietary protection or competitive advantages, and we may not
be able to prevent third parties from infringing these patents. Therefore, the exact effect of our patents and the other steps we have taken to
protect our intellectual property cannot be predicted with certainty.
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