“In the ongoing Apple v. Samsung II trial in the Northern District of California, Apple’s lawyers try hard to downplay Google’s role, though it’s blindingly obvious that Google is the true target of Apple’s second California lawsuit against Samsung,” Florian Müller writes for FOSS Patents. “Usually a twelve-mile drive (from Cupertino to Mountain View) is more convenient than a twelve-hour flight (from San Francisco to Seoul), but in this case, Apple seeks to benefit from the statistically-established bias of U.S. jurors against foreign companies. Also, the fact that Samsung sells actual devices is an opportunity for Apple to disingenuously make damages claims that run counter to its own, repeatedly-stated position on the proper royalty base for patent licenses and damages. The proper royalty base for Apple’s asserted patents in the ongoing trial is Google’s Android.”
“Maybe Apple’s counsel can fool a jury, but Apple for sure can’t fool Judge Koh’s boss,” Müller writes. “The Chief District Judge of the Northern District of California, Claudia Wilken, wrote in an order (handed down yesterday) that the Rockstar Consortium’s ‘scare the customer and run’ tactic advances Apple’s interest in interfering with Google’s Android business” and made various other findings relating to Apple’s anti-Google/anti-Android agenda.”
“Before I quote the entire Apple-related passage… I’d like to defend Apple to some extent here, or to at least give it the benefit of the doubt. I agree with Judge Wilken’s conclusion that Apple, since it contributed 58% of Rockstar’s funding and has strategic interests relating to Android, has created a situation in which Rockstar has continuing obligations to Apple — obligations to monetize those patents. However, the fact that Apple is (likely) a majority shareholder does not necessarily mean that Apple has a majority of the voting rights,” Müller writes. “It’s actually unlikely that Apple holds a majority of the votes: its partners are large players like Microsoft and Ericsson, who would hardly have accepted to be (collectively!) Apple’s junior partner in terms of control. And if my assumption is right and Apple does not have a majority, then it is possible that Apple participated in the Nortel patent-buying effort only to clear the market of those patents (so as to avoid that Google would use them against it) but perhaps never wanted Rockstar to go out and sue the world including non-smartphone companies like cable operators using Cisco equipment. Maybe Apple even voted consistently against litigation, but wasn’t able to singlehandedly prevent it from happening.”
Much more in the full article here.