AWR® Corp. announced that it won its motion for partial summary judgment against ZTE Corp., the largest publically traded Chinese telecommunications company. ZTE violated the terms of AWR’s software license agreement, which prohibits access and use of its proprietary software with “cracked” or unauthorized license codes, according to a press release issued by AWR on June 15.

Dane Collins, CEO of AWR, added, “On behalf of AWR employees and customers, I am gratified by the ruling and look forward to prevailing on our remaining claims at our trial on August 9th.”

The United States District Court for the Central District of California granted AWR's motion for partial summary judgment, holding ZTE liable for breach of contract. AWR argued that when ZTE employees installed AWR’s software, ZTE became bound by a click-through license agreement that prohibited its employees from using the software with unauthorized "cracked" licenses.

“Piracy is a huge problem for EDA and other engineering software providers around the world,” stated Kathryn Kranen, Vice Chairman, EDA Consortium. “Piracy hurts paying customers by distorting their competitive playing fields. EDA Consortium members, including AWR, have an active program to assure that our customers benefit from elimination of software piracy."