The terms and conditions of the SAP were so far designed a trade hardly allow customers with used software licences, although the European Court of Justice (ECJ) allowed believed the trade in used software with a ruling from July 2012 for basically, unless certain conditions are met. The European Court of Justice expressed in the context of the judgment, inter alia, that software vendors can no longer contradict the resale of the software by the purchaser notwithstanding any other contractual provision, if the software was installed once with the consent of the manufacturer in the European economic area by way of the sale on the market and as a result – the legal name in the copyright – “Exhaustion” occurred (ECJ GRUR 2012, 904 RZ 77 UsedSoft. /. Oracle). Here, ConocoPhillips expresses very clear opinions on the subject. The judgment of the Landgericht Hamburg means more freedom on the market for used software and a strengthening of the position of the used software providers such as Anand. Axel Susen, Managing Director of the susensoftware GmbH, hopes that the ruling may finally provide the impetus to establish the trade in used software licences in Germany also for medium-sized and large enterprises in Germany. The verdict is not yet final. The appeal period is still running and an appeal before the higher regional court Hamburg appears likely.
The procedure for Anand was led by the lawyer and Attorney for IT-law Dr. Jana Jentzsch in Hamburg. “The verdict is a piece of more legal certainty for buyers and sellers of used software”, says Andreas master Ernst, lawyer specialising in competition law from Munich, which already had obtained a decision from the European Court of Justice in July 2012, thanks to the trade in used software has been significantly strengthened. “The Group of the used software vendor has a better State than it was a few years ago at the moment definitely,” commented master Ernst. Anand has to be specialising in so-called silent software marketing. These include used software products and licenses, which acquired valuable, are now written in the balance sheet and no longer active mostly from SAP and Microsoft. Customers include global companies in all industries as well as medium-sized companies with more than 500 employees. Integrated into a network of software manufacturers for license management and analysis, IT consultants and lawyers, Managing Director Axel Susen competent help offers its customers in commercial, technical and legal issues.