Several devices, from portable computers and personal digital assistants (PDAs) to mobile phones and video cameras, use liquid crystal display (LCD) technology to render images on a screen. Before these innovations existed, the smallest level of detail that a computer could use was a single pixel. With ClearType font technology, LCD monitors now can display features of text as small as a fraction of a pixel in width. The result is that the words on a computer screen now look almost as sharp and clear as those printed on a piece of paper.

Patent

Microsoft holds various U.S. patents in this licensing program. These patents include the following:
Subpixel rendering: 6,188,385; 6,219,025; 6,239,783; 6,307,566Complex color filtering: 6,225,973; 6,243,070; 6,393,145Subpixel font hinting and layout: 6,421,054; 6,282,327ClearType tuning: 6,624,828

Besides these issued patents, the patent licensing package includes rights to certain innovations for which Microsoft has filed a claim for a patent that the U.S. Patent Office has not yet granted. This licensing program also provides licensees with rights to certain Microsoft patents that are registered outside the United States.