A California jury awarded Apple Inc more than $1.05 billion on Friday in its patent infringement claim that Samsung Electronics Co copied technology used in its iPad and iPhone.
The nine-member jury in a federal court in San Jose, California, found overwhelmingly in Apple’s favour, saying Samsung had infringed on six of seven smartphone patents in question.
The US lawsuit was one of several cases around the world between California-based Apple and South Korean Samsung over technology rights and innovation in the fast-growing mobile computing sector.
Apple sued Samsung in April 2011, and Samsung countersued. The companies have also sued each other in Britain, Australia and South Korea. The California case was the first to go to a US jury.
Apple sought $2.75 billion for its claims that Samsung infringed four design patents and three software patents. Samsung demanded as much as $421.8 million in royalties for claims that Apple infringed five patents.
The complexity of the case was compounded by Apple’s contention that nearly two dozen of Samsung’s devices violated its patents.
The disputes date to 2010 when Samsung released its Galaxy smartphones. Apple immediately suspected that Galaxy phones copied the iPhone, which had been on the market for three years.
Apple and Samsung are the world’s largest makers of handheld devices that blend phone and a computer functionality.
Sales of the iPhone totalled 47 billion dollars in 2011, while iPad sales totaled 20.4 billion dollars, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Together they comprised 62 per cent of Apple’s sales in fiscal 2011.
In smartphone sales, Samsung has a lead over Apple with about 32 per cent of the market to Apple’s 17 per cent, according to technology market researcher IDC.
In a related decision, the US International Trade Commission ruled Friday that Apple did not infringe two patents owned by Google Inc’s Motorola Mobility unit for wireless technologies.
The commission stopped short of resolving their dispute, ordering a trade judge to reconsider Motorola Mobility’s claim that Apple had violated another patent.
Keywords: Apple Samsung case, patent infringement
@ Atma Gandhi and Davekrit,
US courts favoring US companies? Same day what happened in South Korea. South Korean courts favored Samsung. Happens in all the countries. At least in US, the judges cannot be bought.
From the very beginning Apple is known for its new and innovative
products. The amount of hard work and dedication that Apple has put
towards its work and company by providing new technology to the people
is admirable. Apple has a image in the market that no other brand can
take it away from them.
Many in the US say that the patent system is broken. Should Samsung make a phone that is shaped like a boat instead of a cuboid just because apple made that shape?
Time to make everything free and open. Look at the internet protocol. It is open and not dominated by one corporation. If it were patented, it would have become costly and inaccessible to many.
Apple, under the leadership of Steve has been an organisation driven by
constant innovation. This judgement should warn those who try to copy
ideas.
It seems some companies, no matter how big they are, have no respect for another company's sheer power of innovation and singularity of purpose. If around the world, plagiarism was allowed like we allow in India, there won't be any room or incentive for any sort of innovation.
This should be a good lesson to all the pretenders. Of course, we have a habit of worshipping whoever succeeds monetarily, but here, clearly, is a case of Apple being responsible for the success of both themselves AND Samsung! I for one, will definitely not be buying any Samsung products for this belligerent disrespect of another's excellence and hard work.
Its really very sad how a company can manipulate the Intellectual
property laws to get patents on rectangles and arcs. I think the shapes
are very intuitive and patenting them leaves very little chance for
other companies to innovate.
Happy to hear that.
Apple has always been exclusive in making their products. If you'll gaze at both tabs
(iPad and Samsung tab) from a mere stone's throw you resemble samsung tab as a
exact copy of iPad. There is no second thought to it that most of the smartphones
and tablets are literal transcriptions of Apple's iconic iPhone and iPad.
Apple has got it's reward for their honest policies and exclusive ideas.
US is always favouring Apple and Microsoft; it even robs people's fundamental right to do them benefit (software patents). It promotes closed source non-free software to enforce monopoly to Apple and Microsoft. US is sold out to big monopolies.
All in all, US is a bad place to do software business.
This is good news!! i still remember the first time i saw a Samsung
Galxy, abt an year back , the first thing i noticed was that the OS is
copied from Apple...
US Courts have joined Other regulators in punishing non-US companies so that American Companies gain in market.
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