Brad Smith, General Counsel and SVP, Microsoft, said Microsoft welcomes the Apple-HTC lawsuit to figure out intellectual property concerns in the industry.

“The fact that there’s litigation in this area is not necessarily a bad thing.” [Seattle Times]

Smith made the statement in a speech to intellectual and copyright lawyers at the Washington State Convention Center.

While the excuse is that it will help mobile companies reach a standard royalty payment method, Microsoft is hardly innocent in its happiness. It knows that with HTC on the line, users are bound to get excited about its upcoming Windows Phone 7 Series platform. The company also knows that Apple’s desire is to prevent Android from growing, and Apple would much rather see Microsoft succeed in the mobile space than arch-rival Google.