The case dates back to 1999 when negotiations began between streaming media company Burst.com and Microsoft over the possibility of a licence for Burst's technology that would allow high quality video-on-demand over the internet. After two years, negotiations broke down.
Burst sued in June 2002, alleging that Microsoft's newly announced 'Corona' product used technologies and trade secrets misappropriated from Burst.com following the unsuccessful negotiations. The suit alleged patent infringement, breach of the California Trade Secrets Act, and breach of contract.
The Santa Rosa, California-based company also alleged anti-trust practices, with the support of Sun Microsystems, Be and Netscape, arguing that Microsoft used its dominant market position to encourage companies not to use Burst's software.
The most recent hearing related to e-mail communications by six Microsoft executives. Burst has records of these e-mails, but Microsoft has been unable to produce them in court, according to the News.com report.
A transcript of the hearing, seen by News.com, quotes Spencer Hosie, one of Burst's lawyers:
"We list 70 e-mails that went back and forth between the parties that Burst had that Microsoft did not produce. These were e-mails that absolutely undeniably existed once, but for some reason are no longer at Microsoft Systems."
The District Court Judge, Frederick Motz, has ordered Microsoft to hunt for the missing or deleted e-mails among its backup tapes and servers.
