“Samsung Electronics Co.’s countersuits against Apple Inc.’s allegations of product copying have expanded to six countries, the company said Thursday, and now include a complaint with the International Trade Commission seeking to stop the sale of popular Apple products in the U.S.,” Evan Ramstad reports for The Wall Street Journal.

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“The suits appear part of a broad strategy by Samsung to fight Apple’s lawsuit over the design of its smartphones and tablet computers with a barrage of litigation around the world,” Ramstad reports. “By doing so, Samsung would build leverage that might force Apple to settle the initial case—which threatens to damage Samsung’s efforts to catch up to Apple in the smartphone and tablet markets, where profit margins are relatively high and market leadership is unsettled.”

Ramstad reports, “The fight is one of many that have been filed over the past year over smartphone and tablet technology. But this one has gained greater attention because Apple and Samsung, while competing in consumer products, have a customer-supplier relationship in which Apple is the biggest buyer of Samsung’s device components, including chips and screens. That has prompted speculation throughout the electronics industry that Apple might try to end its supplier relationship with Samsung. Such a move would prove costly to Samsung’s chip business, which has yielded the company’s highest profits for the past two years.”

Read more in the full article, which includes a video in which The Wall Street Journal’s Technology Editor Yun-Hee Kim talks about what’s at stake and how it could play out with WSJ’s Andrew LaVallee, here.

[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader "Thumper" for the heads up.]