AN FRANCISCO, USA: A former Google Inc. (GOOG) engineer who played a key role developing the Android mobile phone software--now under legal fire from Oracle Corp. ---testified here today that he removed some elements of Sun's Java technology after litigation had begun.

Oracle bought Sun in early 2010 and sued Google roughly eight months later.

Oracle alleges Google copied portions of Java and that Android therefore infringes copyrights and patents that protect the technology.