The company fears being shut out of smartphone handsets, first by Apple and now Google.

Apple (AAPL) started using Skyhook's location based services for their iOS Maps application June 2008 and   dropped Skyhook April 2010 after it developed its own location-based mapping system.

That's one of the benefits of making your own hardware and software.

Unfortunately for Google (GOOG), who doesn't make hardware and also wants to supplant Skyhook's services with its own, dropping Skyhook is more complex and litigious.  Google has told its carrier partners (Motorola and  company X -- likely Samsung) that they would have to drop Skyhook   to keep using Android, according to documents Skyhook filed in court.

Google Vice President of Engineering Andy Rubin, according to the suit,  called Motorola Co-CEO Sanjay Jha to impose a "stop ship" order, preventing Motorola from shipping Android wireless devices [the Droid X is the device named] featuring Skyhook's XPS software.

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