“Apple Inc. and Samsung Electronics Co. are starting to wind down their global patent battle,” Adam Satariano and Joel Rosenblatt report for Bloomberg.
“The companies said in a joint statement today that they have agreed to drop all suits against each other in countries outside the U.S.,” Satariano and Rosenblatt report. “Claims are being abandoned in Australia, Japan, South Korea, Germany, Netherlands, the U.K., France and Italy.”
“The agreement shows Apple and Samsung may be nearing a conclusion to what has been a drawn-out and occasionally nasty worldwide patent fight, which has sprouted alongside the booming market for touch-screen smartphones. Apple has accused Samsung of copying its iPhone designs,” Satariano and Rosenblatt report. “There had already been signs of de-escalation prior to today’s announcement. Apple and Samsung agreed in June to drop their appeals of a patent-infringement case at the U.S. International Trade Commission that resulted in an import ban on some older Samsung phones. Apple and Google Inc., which makes the Android mobile operating system that Samsung uses in many of its handsets, also announced a deal in May to drop lawsuits against one another related to Motorola Mobility.”
Read more in the full article here.
“‘Apple and Samsung have agreed to drop all litigation between the two companies outside the United States,’ the companies said in a joint statement. ‘This agreement does not involve any licensing arrangements, and the companies are continuing to pursue the existing cases in U.S. courts,'” Daisuke Wakabayashi reports for The Wall Street Journal.
“The main dispute is taking place in the U.S., where Apple has won two jury verdicts in U.S. District Court in San Jose, Calif., finding that the Korean electronics giant had copied features of the iPhone with damages totaling more than $1 billion. Samsung has said it would appeal both decisions,” Wakabayashi reports. “The latest trial, which ended in May, raised questions about the merits of Apple’s legal strategy. Apple won the case, but was awarded damages of $119 million, far short of the $2.2 billion it had sought.”
“Apple has yet to collect a dime from either case and it hasn’t gotten what it really wanted: a far-reaching injunction on sales of certain Samsung phones and tablets,” Wakabayashi reports. “‘The U.S. litigation is the most important. There is the most at stake. Apple in particular is hesitant to let it go,’ said Michael Carrier, a patent-law expert and law professor at Rutgers University. ‘I think Apple is coming to the realization step by step that this litigation is not worth it.'”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Apple is coming to the realization step by step that, due to the antiquated and stagnant legal systems’ lack of protection from blatant IP theft and trade dress infringement, this litigation is not worth it. There, fixed it for ya.
This is how thermonuclear war ends. Not with a bang, but with a whimper. Because the justice system is broken. Justice simply wasn’t served. Crime was allowed to pay.
The good news is that there’s more than one way to skin a cat. And that cat is about to be skinned alive:
An iPhone with a larger screen option will hurt Samsung immeasurably more than myriad, unending traipses through the legal morass. – MacDailyNews, May 2, 2014
Apple’s products came first, then Samsung’s:
Here’s what Google’s Android looked like before and after Apple’s iPhone:
Here’s what cellphones looked like before and after Apple’s iPhone:
Yup, looks like crime does pay, because the justice system is broken.
Fortunately Karma is not broken, so between that and an ongoing boycott, it should serve a little justice to Samsung in the pocket book, where they care most.
CORRECTION:
Apple has accused Samsung of copying its iPhone designs… and WON in related lawsuits. Having proven their point, outside of the USA Apple is now willing to move on to its new line of innovative iPhones while enjoying the decline of Samsung’s knockoff business within the market. 😀
MDN: That’s okay, there’s more than one way to skin a cat.
Note: Please do not eviscerate, cook and eat a skinned cat. Instead, please drop it off at your local cat recycling center.
– A message from your local SPCA.
The fact that Samsung is playing at the lower end of the market where other copycats can and are stealing their lunch (in China, for example). Also, moving a lot of outsourced manufacturing from Samsung hurts them too.
This is Samsung’s game: fight in court as long as you can and once that is exhausted aim to settle. Ending the suits outside the US is acknowledgment that the US ligation is the major point now. Samsung may try to continue the appeals or decide it is time to negotiate. Probably the latter.
The lower sales for their phones means that Samsung are not making the same amount of money on those devices and therefore not worth fighting every battle. Still they win because Apple is willing to end the suits. Samsung will fight tooth and nail to avoid paying $1B in fines to Apple.
Apple moving component sourcing away from Samsung has got to hurt real bad. The true impact may only be felt next year.
Apple’s net devices will be interesting. If the form factor is novel and Samsung copies it immediately then they will be back in court again.
You can never go thermonuclear if you’re depending on a bloated, slow 3rd party for permission to drop the bomb.
Apple was screwed by an inept US Federal Court judge who single-handedly tried to remedy perceived “xenophobia in American courts” …when none was demonstrated in the first place. Sad, sad precedent for US commercial interests w/ IP.
Exactly.
From this point forward I see nothing that will stop IP theft. Like it or not, the justice system is not blind but is inept. Companies like Samsung and countless others in places like China will steal and copy whatever they want and flood the markets with cheap knock-off’s, produced with cheap, almost slave labor because they can.
All anyone needs to do is produce the product in another country with laws favoring the state/county and little or no human rights, then import the products into the US. Even if a company has legitimate claims, it’s will be virtually impossible to stop.
Until the laws and those “interpreting” the laws are changed and clear “transparency” to any personal or political gains and/or finances, I see no change.
As I’ve said before, “We (the USofA) are Rome”. Like it or not, history is repeating itself.
All this brio hah hah…
Apple has not been harmed by Samsung who clearly copied Apple. Apple won that case.
the rest of the case will be settled by consumers.
Copy cat entities like samsung exist everywhere. Knock offs increase the value of the real thing.
A fake rolex is an aspirational product, much like an Android phone.