RIM and NTP settle for $612 million ... finally

Blackberry users can at last breathe a sigh of relief: RIM and NTP have reached a settlement in their long-running patent dispute, with RIM agreeing to pay NTP $612.5 million. According to RIM, the settlement has been approved by the court, and NTP's suit has been dismissed, which means this settlement is likely to last a little longer than an earlier one, in which RIM agreed to pay NTP $450 million. That settlement eventually collapsed, leading to the most recent round of hearings (and NTP's little $162 million premium). Now that this battle is over, we're ready to see how RIM does in a real fight: the coming battle with Microsoft for dominance of the push email market (and we wouldn't rule out another lawsuit from RIM -- this time as a plaintiff, with the US Patent and Trademark Office on the other side).