Apple and Google have joined forces to offer more than $500 million (€388 million) to buy Eastman Kodak’s patents out of bankruptcy, according to sources. They partnered after leading two separate groups this summer to buy some of Kodak’s 1,100 imaging patents.

Unlikely partnerships are typical in patent sales because they allow competitors to neutralise potential infringement litigation.

A group including Apple, Microsoft and Research in Motion bought Nortel Networks’s more than 6,000 patents for $4.5 billion out of bankruptcy last year. - (Bloomberg)