Samsung Launches Legal Strike Against the iPhone 5
It took Samsung (LI:SMSN) less than ten days to examine the new iPhone 5 and determine that Apple’s flagship device is infringing at least eight of its patents, including its wireless data technology. The South Korean company has now included the newest iPhone in its lawsuit claim against Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) with the case scheduled for trial in 2014.
The legal motion is a clear retaliation from Samsung coming as a result of its August US court loss that ruled in Apple’s favour and fined its rival $1 billion. “We have always preferred to compete in the marketplace with our innovative products, rather than in courtrooms,” said a Samsung spokesperson as quoted by the Financial Times “However, Apple continues to take aggressive legal measures that will limit market competition. Under these circumstances, we have little choice but to take the steps necessary to protect our innovations and intellectual property rights.” The company has not yet ruled out the option of pushing for a sales ban on the new iPhone.
!m[](/uploads/story/504/thumbs/pic1_inline.png)On Monday Samsung won a court order and managed to lift the ban on US sales of its Galaxy Tab 10.1 tablet that was imposed on 26 June before the month-long patent-infringements trial. The order was issued by US District Judge Lucy Koh in San Jose, California, after the jury found that Samsung did not infringe a design patent that had been the basis for the temporary ban.
“The court does not agree with Apple that Samsung’s motion for dissolution of the June 26 preliminary injunction cannot be fairly decided without resolving Apple’s post-trial motions,” Judge Lucy Koh ruled
“We are pleased with the court’s action today, which vindicates our position that there was no infringement of Apple’s design patent and that an injunction was not called for,” Samsung said in an e-mailed statement as quoted by Bloomberg.
The two multi-billion companies are locked in legal battles on four different continents for the largest piece of a $219 billion smartphone market and despite Apple’s ongoing success in the US, Samsung has been dominating the courts in Japan and South Korea. According to analysts the legal dispute might strain the working relationship between the companies as Samsung remains the biggest supplier of components for the iPhone and Apple has already began reducing the proportion of screens and chips it purchases from its rival.
Apple’s stock has taken a dive in the past week and reached $659.39 a share on Tuesday as a result of supply concerns over the new iPhone 5 and technical mishaps with the iOS6. The company boasted that 100 million older-generation iDevices have upgraded to the new iOS but according to the data research firm Strategy Analytics the number isn’t all that impressive given there are 283 million iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch users in the Apple-verse. This means a large number of the customer base refused to upgrade when they were prompted to do so in all likelihood because of significant problems with the Apple Maps application. Tim Cook, Apple’s chief executive, has formally apologized for the flaws in the mapping service and went so far as to suggest users to take advantage of alternative applications including Google Maps.
Are you looking for fast-news, hot-tips and market analysis? Sign-up for the Invezz newsletter, today.
