CORRECTED - U.S. court denies most SAP motions in Oracle suit

(Corrects first paragraph to say "parts of a lawsuit" not "a lawsuit")

LONDON, Dec 16 (Reuters) - German software company SAP (SAPG.DE) may have breached contracts by downloading Oracle (ORCL.O) software, a U.S. court ruled, rejecting SAP's attempt to get parts of a lawsuit against it dropped.

The court did grant two SAP motions that argued certain Oracle legal entities did not have the right to sue for copyright infringment, but it rejected SAP's other arguments in the latest twist of the marathon intellectual property-theft case.

U.S.-based Oracle alleges that TomorrowNow, a U.S. subsidiary of Germany's SAP, stole and misused its property by illegally downloading its customer-support materials in order to provide cut-price services for Oracle's customers.

The case has sharpened the rivalry between SAP, the world's biggest maker of software to help companies automate processes like supply-chain management, and database giant Oracle, which has made a string of acquisitions to challenge SAP's lead.

SAP bought TomorrowNow, a third-party provider of support for PeopleSoft and JD Edwards software, at the beginning of 2005, shortly after Oracle announced it would buy PeopleSoft, which had previously acquired JD Edwards.

SAP has acknowledged that TomorrowNow employees carried out some "inappropriate" downloads and has since wound down TomorrowNow's operations, but denies amassing a library of Oracle materials for its own use.

The court agreed with SAP to dismiss claims by two of the three Oracle entities claiming copyright infringement on the grounds they were not or could not demonstrate they were holders of the relevant copyright.

But copyright claims by the third entity, Oracle International Corporation, were not challenged by SAP.

The court also upheld Oracle's right to sue for breach of contract and unjust enrichment and restitution.

SAP had argued that TomorrowNow employees could not have breached contracts relating to customer terms of use when downloading support materials because they were not party to the contracts, which it said could only bind the actual customers.

The court rejected this argument, saying that such so-called "clickwrap agreements" -- where the online user clicks "I Agree" before continuing to password-protected areas of a Website -- had been found enforceable by many courts.

It also rejected SAP's argument that Oracle's claim of unjust enrichment should be rejected as not being a legally proper claim.

SAP said in a statement: "While we are disappointed the court did not accept all of SAP's positions at this time, we look forward to working with the court to achieve the proper resolution of this case."

SAP is due to give its response to the latest version of Oracle's complaint on Dec. 30. (Reporting by Georgina Prodhan; Editing by Andrew Callus)