Apple now argues it practiced 3 asserted patent claims in the past, Samsung disputes

12 years ago

“It’s an oddity that on the third day of the Apple v. Samsung II trial in California the debate is not about whether Google and Samsung infringe Apple’s patents-in-suit but whether Apple itself practices its patents, or more specifically the asserted patent claims,” Florian Müller writes for FOSS Patents. “This morning by California time, Apple and Samsung just made submissions in response to Judge Koh’s Thursday evening order. The judge presiding over this trial had largely denied Apple’s motion for permission to present evidence (and curative instructions) but requested further briefing ‘as to what timely produced and/or timely disclosed evidence exists in the record as to whether Apple in the past practiced Claim 20 of the ‘414 Patent, Claim 18 of the ‘172 Patent, and Claim 25 of the ‘959 Patent’ (emphasis added).”

“At first sight I think it’s possible that something will be told to the jury about Apple’s claim of past use, but what Apple has filed is probably not strong enough, especially in light of the stipulation, to fundamentally change the jury’s perception,” Müller writes. “The jury now knows and will still know, even if Apple makes a past-practice argument, that those three asserted claims are simply not coextensive with the ‘features’ Apple alleges Google and Samsung have copied. This means that the features can be implemented without infringing those claims, and it limits the commercial value of the claims. I think the name of the game for Apple in connection with practice, non-practice and past price is now just to contain the damage.”

Read more in the full article here.

MacDailyNews Take: If Apple’s crack legal team ever recoups anything near to what Google, Samsung et al. have stolen from Apple, we’ll eat our Macs.