Kent Walker, chief lawyer at Google has said that the patents in the smartphone market are being used in a race, which is "gumming up the works of innovation" and has urged the government to address the problem.

Google is facing a lawsuit running into billions of dollars from Oracle that alleges that the Android platform infringes upon many of its patents. Mobile phone makers related to the platform including such as HTC and Samsung are facing claims that their devices use technology owned by others including Microsoft.

Walker said that patents meant "the tech industry has a significant problem" and that "software patents are kind of gumming up the works of innovation." He added that the company is evaluating various options.

Many in the US are beginning to see patents as an obstacle to innovation. The emergence of the so called patent trolls, the firms which earn revenues through litigation of infringements, as well as large firms using lawsuits to check competition.