Microsoft and Google reached an agreement to settle the dispute on Google's employment of Mircrosoft's former employee Lee Kai-Fu.

The agreement was confidential and all the sides were satisfied with it since it settled the dispute, according to a statement from Microsoft (Shanghai) Company on Friday.

The agreement indicated the end of a five-month wrangle on Lee's job-hopping.

Lee, a Chinese-American and former Microsoft vice-president, left Microsoft and sought a position in Google to head Google's research business in China this July.

Lee said Google had a kind of enterprise culture and entrepreneur spirit that he treasured and felt proud of and he also liked Google's teamwork spirit, energetic environment and respect for individuals.

Microsoft sued Lee and Google in a Washington state court, contending that Lee's job at Google would violate confidentiality and non-competition clauses in his employee contract. Microsoft also accused Lee of using insider information to get his job at Google.

Google responded with its own lawsuit against Microsoft in the U.S. District Court in San Jose, California.

(Xinhua News Agency December 26, 2005)