AMQP Working Group: AMQP License Agreement
This AMQP License covers versions of the AMQP specification developed prior to October 2011 by the AMQP Working Group. AMQP versions published subsequent to October 2011 are covered under the OASIS terms described in the 'Notices' section of each document.
This License Agreement grants developers a broad set of rights to encourage widespread distribution and implementation of AMQP. The license contains specific provisions to give you the unambiguous right to implement and licenses to any necessary patents held by AMQP Working Group firms, as provided by the following key excerpt:
The Authors each hereby grants to you a worldwide, perpetual, royalty-free, non-transferable, nonexclusive license to (i) copy, display, distribute and implement the Advanced Messaging Queue Protocol ("AMQP") Specification and (ii) the Licensed Claims that are held by the Authors, all for the purpose of implementing the Advanced Messaging Queue Protocol Specification.
Text of the AMQP License Agreement
Bank of America, N.A., Barclays Bank PLC, Cisco Systems, Credit Suisse, Deutsche Börse, Goldman Sachs, HCL Technologies Ltd, IIT Software GmbH, INETCO Systems Limited, Informatica Corporation, JPMorgan Chase & Co., Kaazing Corporation, N.A, Microsoft Corporation, my-Channels, Novell, Progress Software, Red Hat Inc., Software AG, Solace Systems Inc., StormMQ Ltd., Tervela Inc., TWIST Process Innovations Ltd, VMware Inc., and WS02 Inc.
(collectively, the "Authors") each hereby grants to you a worldwide, perpetual, royalty-free, nontransferable, nonexclusive license to (i) copy, display, distribute and implement the Advanced Message Queuing Protocol ("AMQP") Specification and (ii) the Licensed Claims that are held by the Authors, all for the purpose of implementing the Advanced Message Queuing Protocol Specification.Your license and any rights under this Agreement will terminate immediately without notice from any Author if you bring any claim, suit, demand, or action related to the Advanced Message Queuing Protocol Specification against any Author. Upon termination, you shall destroy all copies of the Advanced Message Queuing Protocol Specification in your possession or control.
As used hereunder, "Licensed Claims" means those claims of a patent or patent application, throughout the world, excluding design patents and design registrations, owned or controlled, or that can be sublicensed without fee and in compliance with the requirements of this Agreement, by an Author or its affiliates now or at any future time and which would necessarily be infringed by implementation of the Advanced Message Queuing Protocol Specification. A claim is necessarily infringed hereunder only when it is not possible to avoid infringing it because there is no plausible non-infringing alternative for implementing the required portions of the Advanced Message Queuing Protocol Specification. Notwithstanding the foregoing, Licensed Claims shall not include any claims other than as set forth above even if contained in the same patent as Licensed Claims; or that read solely on any implementations of any portion of the Advanced Message Queuing Protocol Specification that are not required by the Advanced Message Queuing Protocol Specification, or that, if licensed, would require a payment of royalties by the licensor to unaffiliated third parties. Moreover, Licensed Claims shall not include (i) any enabling technologies that may be necessary to make or use any Licensed Product but are not themselves expressly set forth in the Advanced Message Queuing Protocol Specification (e.g., semiconductor manufacturing technology, compiler technology, object oriented technology, networking technology, operating system technology, and the like); or (ii) the implementation of other published standards developed elsewhere and merely referred to in the body of the Advanced Message Queuing Protocol Specification, or (iii) any Licensed Product and any combinations thereof the purpose or function of which is not required for compliance with the Advanced Message Queuing Protocol Specification. For purposes of this definition, the Advanced Message Queuing Protocol Specification shall be deemed to include both architectural and interconnection requirements essential for interoperability and may also include supporting source code artifacts where such architectural, interconnection requirements and source code artifacts are expressly identified as being required or documentation to achieve compliance with the Advanced Message Queuing Protocol Specification.
As used hereunder, "Licensed Products" means only those specific portions of products (hardware, software or combinations thereof) that implement and are compliant with all relevant portions of the Advanced Message Queuing Protocol Specification.
The following disclaimers, which you hereby also acknowledge as to any use you may make of the Advanced Message Queuing Protocol Specification:
THE ADVANCED MESSAGE QUEUING PROTOCOL SPECIFICATION IS PROVIDED "AS IS," AND THE AUTHORS MAKE NO REPRESENTATIONS OR WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, NON-INFRINGEMENT, OR TITLE; THAT THE CONTENTS OF THE ADVANCED MESSAGE QUEUING PROTOCOL SPECIFICATION ARE SUITABLE FOR ANY PURPOSE; NOR THAT THE IMPLEMENTATION OF THE ADVANCED MESSAGE QUEUING PROTOCOL SPECIFICATION WILL NOT INFRINGE ANY THIRD PARTY PATENTS, COPYRIGHTS, TRADEMARKS OR OTHER RIGHTS.
THE AUTHORS WILL NOT BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES ARISING OUT OF OR RELATING TO ANY USE, IMPLEMENTATION OR DISTRIBUTION OF THE ADVANCED MESSAGE QUEUING PROTOCOL SPECIFICATION.
No other rights are granted by implication, estoppel or otherwise.
Upon termination of your license or rights under this Agreement, you shall destroy all copies of the Advanced Message Queuing Protocol Specification in your possession or control.