A U.S. District Court jury recently ruled the company had infringed on patents held by French telecommunications equipment company Alcatel-Lucent and ordered the software giant to pay $1.52 billion in damages in a decision that could have long-reaching effects on the digital music business.

That’s because the patents that Microsoft infringed upon are related to playing MP3 files. If the jury’s decision is left to stand, Alcatel-Lucent could go after other companies, such as Sony, Apple or any other company manufacturing MP3 players or software used to play the digital music files.

In its defense, Microsoft said it had already paid German research company Fraunhofer Gesellschaft $16 million to license that company’s MP3 technology. Fraunhofer Gesellschaft created M-PEG 1, Audio Layer 3, otherwise known as MP3, in the early 1990s.

However, Alcatel-Lucent was able to persuade the jury that its patents were fundamental in compressing audio files.

Microsoft’s patent troubles with Alcatel-Lucent started in 2003 when Lucent filed an infringement suit against Gateway and Dell over patents developed by Lucent’s Bell Labs. Microsoft asked to be included in the lawsuit, saying that the patents were tied to its Windows operating system. When Alcatel and Lucent merged in 2006 it kept the patent litigation going.

Eventually the judge threw out two claims and scheduled six separate trials to decide the remaining. The trial that resulted in the $1.52 billion award to Alcatel-Lucent began on January 29th.

Like any company facing a billion-dollar judgment against it, Microsoft plans to fight back, and will petition the judge to reduce, or set aside, the verdict, according to the Los Angeles Times.

“We think this verdict is completely unsupported by the law or the facts,” Microsoft deputy general counsel Tom Burt said.

But even if the judgment stands, writing a $1.52 billion check isn’t going to put Microsoft in the poor house.

Reuters estimates that the amount represents about six weeks of cash flow for the company. Or about 15 cents per share.