“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.”
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“‘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.'”
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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:
