“The Motorola-Apple dispute, which started in October 2010, has a complex procedural history. Even the “Posner case” at some point passed through the Western District of Wisconsin, but Judge Crabb passed it on to “a kind judge in Chicago who enjoys trying patent cases” — i.e., Judge Posner,” Florian Müller writes for FOSS Patents.
“Subsequently, Apple would have liked to see the two cases consolidated in Illinois, but just to be clear, the procedural origin of the Wisconsin FRAND antitrust and contract case is that Apple brought counterclaims to Motorola’s ITC complaint, and counterclaims must be immediately removed from ITC investigations to a district court,” Müller writes. “Apple selected Wisconsin for this purpose. The ITC investigation went nowhere: the U.S. trade agency tossed the remainder of Motorola’s complaint (one non-SEP) in April 2013. In August 2012 the ITC had already sided with Apple on three Motorola patents, including a SEP that a judge held Apple (in an April 2012 preliminary ruling) to infringe. Two Google appeals relating to that one ITC investigation are before the Federal Circuit.”
Müller writes, “The most interesting economic information is that Motorola, according to the brief, ‘demand[s] that Apple take a license at a rate that was more than 12 times what Motorola was charging other licensees for the same technology–a rate that was unfair, unreasonable, and decidedly discriminatory.'”
Much more in the full article here.