In the latest news in the patent case that feels like it will never end, a number of tech giants have taken Samsung’s side in its appeal against the damages it was ordered to pay for infringing Apple’s patents.
It’s almost three years since Apple was awarded $1B in damages after a jury found that Samsung infringed five of its patents. $450M of that award was later vacated and a retrial ordered to determine a revised sum, with Apple awarded a lower sum of $290M – for a revised total of $930M. The US appeals court later ruled that while Samsung did indeed copy iOS features, it should not have been penalised for copying the general look of the iPhone. The court now needs to once again revise the amount awarded.
The amount awarded in part reflected the profits Samsung was deemed to have made by infringing the patents, and it is this aspect that Google, Facebook, Dell, HP, eBay and other tech companies say is unreasonable …
Inside Sources reports that the tech companies filed what’s known as an Amicus briefing – an opinion expressed by those not directly involved in the case – arguing that turning over the full profits made from a product made no sense where just a few features among thousands were copied. The companies suggest that the precedent would encourage a mass of similar lawsuits.
“If allowed to stand, that decision will lead to absurd results and have a devastating impact on companies, including [those filing the brief], who spend billions of dollars annually on research and development for complex technologies and their components,” the group wrote in its brief to the court earlier this month.
The brief said that a few hardware components among thousands, and a few lines of code among millions, may be “largely insignificant to the user” when making the choice of product, and that upholding the ruling would stifle innovation and harm consumers.
While it may seem odd to argue that stiff penalties for copying features would stifle innovation, the argument would seem to be that companies will be afraid to develop new approaches in case they inadvertently infringe another company’s profits – it would be safer to simply continue to offer similar products to their existing ones.
Apple said that the brief should be dismissed on the grounds that an Amicus briefing can only be submitted by those with no personal interest in the case. It argued that because Samsung devices use Google’s Android operating system, Google has a direct stake in the outcome.
“Google has a strong interest in this particular case, is not an impartial ‘friend of the court,’ and should not be permitted to expand Samsung’s word limit under the guise of an amicus brief,” Apple told the court.
The case continues.
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Of course they will. They want to be able to copy the designs too – who wouldn’t!?
Wow, a list of companies that all have a track record for copying and stealing from others and for stifling innovation.
My thought exactly – Especially Google and Facebook!
“Quick — File that brief before we get sued for what we do / have done!”
And apple doesn’t copy? Please. They ALL do. Sure Apple creates the template of what a modern smart phone is and everyone took heed. But ever since then they all copy each other. From a software perspective how many features appeared in Android first (or in jail breaking community)? Yea yea yea android features appeared on iOS first. It goes back and forth.
Yeah right, Apple Music and News are revelutionary
You don’t know what you are talking about.
Just because Apple tends to wait to launch features, doesn’t mean they work on them first, and have them patented.
Sure they weren’t invented by Google or Samsung or HP…
But the sheeps like to hear that Apple invented oxigen, so this kind of arguments are invalid here.
At least these sheep can spell…. Charlypollo, ChrisI84
How many features appeared in Android first? None. Android copied features from iOS jailbreaking community. Get that s.ht straight. You’re illusionate.
And for the record, the entire Android is a copycat to begin with. Look back to re-2007, where was Android? Ask Schmidt, he’d tell you. What the hell would Schmidt haul entire Android project AFTER coming back from Apple 2007 keynote?
Even Steve Jobs quoted Pablo Picasso once: “Good artists copy, great artists steal.”
Not everything Apple announced is it’s own idea – like the notification center, control center and iPhone 6 design which basically looks like HTC One rip-off.
The real quote is ‘bad artists copy, great artists steal’. Apple is a great artist, Samsung is a bad artist doing shitty products.
The iPhone 6 is the continuation of the iPhone 5 design which HTC copied. Get your facts straight.
Googled what you call real quote and found it’s not the real one, sorry. Samsung is also doing processors and other components for Apple. Does it mean iPhone is a shitty product too?
Also, I don’t see nothing similar between the back side of HTC One and iPhone 5. However I see that antenna stripes on the back were used on HTC long before iPhone 6 used the same.
Who ever says HTC One and iPhone 6 look alike, that person is an idiot. Beside the horizontal antenna line, there’s nothing similar between these 2. Galaxy S6 and iPhone 6 are a different story…yeah, do tell.
Fallenjt JT: Different story? Besides the bottom side, there’s nothing similar between iPhone 6 and Galaxy S6.
Here’s why: S6 doesn’t have perfectly rounded bezel. Instead they use half-rounded bezel to avoid any conflict with Apple. Then, unlike iPhone 6, it has all-glass back, while Apple uses one piece of alluminum. And finally, if we compare iPhone 6 to the S6 edge (which is basically premium model), i don’t see edge-to-edge curved display on the iPhone.
So the story between iPhone 6 and Galaxy S6 is pretty much the same one you can find when comparing iPhone 6 to HTC.
Chill. HTC and Apple entered a cross licensing agreement a few years back that would last a few years. They each allowed the other to borrow certain technologies. But I guess it still works out for them that bitter fanboys bicker about who had what first.
That cross licensing agreement should be more common, it would help all the products and maybe even get the radicals from both sides to just…. Chill.
Samsung is going for the record for how many times in a row someone can be found guilty of the same crime.
All of this has made me never want to buy another Samsung product again, and I haven’t for the last three years. Apple should completely cut Samsung off. They should stop buying their components, and totally sever all ties. That will definitely hurt them more than this lawsuit ever will.
Oh please, grow up. They couldn’t if they wanted to and not just because of risk management considerations. And everyone in the industry knows it. The fake public outrage of Apple’s senior management when Samsung or someone else copies them borders on ridiculous. Everyone copies everyone, for a long long time now. True innovation is rare and gets rarer by the day because of pure profit oriented shareholder value thinking. Just because Apple usually improves something or has the got-it-right result doesn’t make their copying any less copying or any less wrong.
I AM grown up. Thanks. I’m entitled to my opinion, and I’m entitled to buy from who ever I want. Piss off.
Talk about getting the award for one of the most ignorant comments here so far, congrats!
No, you were told to grow up for believing Apple could cut ties with Samsung, not for your buying decisions.
And Eddie makes me laugh.
Just now? I stopped buying anything related to Samsung since 2010 and even got rid of Samsung BD player. Samsung free in my house.
Good for you! Be careful. Someone will tell you to “grow up” for not buying Samsung products.
It’s too bad Apple continue feed the dog that bites their hands. If it weren’t for Apple using shamesung components, shamesung mobile would have gone the way of the dodo. The good news is that in a few years, Apple could totally cut off the leash and use components made by other foundries such as TSMC. Perhaps one day Intel will get on the boat and provide what shamesung is currently providing. Without Apple feeding the dog, it shall die from starvation.
They try to go elsewhere for components fabrication, but Samsung’s component division is developed to do what Apple needs. Remember, Apple went to Intel first with the idea of Intel making Apple’s ARM processors and Intel declined. Also, Apple has been buying into other screen mfg like Sharp, but Samsung is a leader in panel mfg. It’s not the component division of Samsung that’s copying Apple, it’s the mobile device division. I still don’t understand how Samsung can get away with their conflict of interest business model where they have a finished goods division and an OEM component division and they compete against their own customers.
Companies those have an interest with the COPYCAT KING company “Shame Sung” defend on their little dog, what do they have to do with this from the first!?
It could be that the shame sung have a record of paying others for doing propaganda.
All of the tech companies steal… It should either be legal or illegal. But, either way… Drop the law down and stick to it. Don’t say it’s illegal to steal and award patents… And then turn around and have a court case on whether that patent should be enforced.
The tech companies make a valid point, but it should be taken with a grain of salt. After all, innovation is also stifled when there is no penalty for stealing.
That being said, Apple is definitely right that Google has a direct interest in this case (Samsung devices run Google software). Google should not be allowed to file an Amicus briefing.
Because after Samsung, Google will be next. BTW, Google will have to pay Oracle soon too. Google is a straight-up copycat…yeah, their software engineers didn’t even bother to change the original comments in the program source codes that they copied, just cut and paste…yup, lousy Google software engineers.
Somebody mentioned Steve Jobs and the Picasso quote. He even followed it up with, “we are shameless about stealing good ideas.”
I mean, look, credit to Android for the notification pulldown and sharing sheet and third party keyboards, stuff I enjoyed since 2010 when I dropped an iPhone 3G for the Nexus One. I couldn’t move back to iPhone the other month if Apple had continued on pretending these ideas had never existed. It simply would have been a dealbreaker.
Jobs by the end of his career had turned into the sort of “evil emperor” that Apple fans in the Beige Box days used to rail against (don’t deny it, the anti-hiring effort basically seals it), and had this vision of being the only company with a cell phone with touchscreen hieuristics. Over the course of this case, they’ve gone from banning entire models of phones for sale entirely (I proudly rocked one while it was happening) to the more rational messgae of, “don’t reverse engineer our software and copy code directly.” But, charging that based on how many they sold is dumb. Not every Samsung customer would have bought an iPhone if Samsung’s custom Android mods and it’s (very outdated) hardware design wasn’t keeping such a close eye on Apple.
This is like if they had to give Apple Music profits to MOG, just because the mechanics behind streaming music are too identical. That wouldn’t make any sense, either.
Not every Samsung customers would buy Samsung phones if they still looked like Blackberry-copycat Blackjack. Entire smart phone industry knew that multi-touch large screen iPhone would be so disruptive, so they had to respond quickly…How could you do that? Create something similar to iPhone with both look and feel…meaning multi-touch, large screen, similar UI and such…That’s when Google reworked entire Android project, going from keyboard input to multitouch input while Samsung dropped copying Blackberry and turned around to make iPhone lookalike products. Yup…that’s the fact.
All in all, all these companies with all their manipulation will have managed to copy everything Apple did in the first iPhone with little complications. Why keep patents intellectual property protection laws if after all they can do whatever they want? Let them copy whatever Apple ever does without consequence and we’ll see how fine innovation will be! Look how many phones now take great inspiration on the design of the iPhone 5 from almost three years ago ! The Galaxy S6 for example for which Samsung was praised because they finally did a ‘premium’ design… but it’s a design originally made by Apple !! Wake up !
If we take the few things that protect Apple from copy, what will remain?
What’s important to remember in a market such as the smartphone or tech market, where all features and changes will eventually crossover is, there’s a difference between blatantly outright copying and doing the same thing.
Apple is oft accused of copying things that they never actually copied. For example, notification center or multitasking. While it was inevitable for these features to be included (as all smartphones now have them), what we must realize is Apple took the idea and made it their own. iOS notification center works differently from Google’s. It has different things and doesn’t include other things (i.e., Apple made notification center and control center two separate things, whereas in other OS’s those are all included in one place). THAT’S the primary difference between Android flat out copying iOS vs. Apple adding features that Palm, RIM, Android, or Windows “already had.”
Apple is also 100% right. Google has a pure vested interest in the outcome of the whole case. So this petition should be thrown out. This is fearmongering at its best. Apple should not only be award the 900+Million. They should also give the Samsung a deadline to pay it by. This has gone on long enough.
Samsung explicitly intended to rip apple off. It was proven in internal memos that were found during the lawsuit.
Intent, motive, opportunity…If this were a murder investigation Samsung would be on death row right now.
How is copying others stifling innovation? I always thought that copying was actually the opposite of innovation.
I think your second sentence answers your question in the first sentence.
Since 2009, I have exclusively purchased (for home and home business) solely Apple products. We ditched as fast as we could our HP and Dell computers. I have a feeling we aren’t the only ones – and that, for any company, is a scary prospect. Instead of pursuing profits through innovation and market differentiation, for a long-established company, it is pretty common to pursue through predatory business practices, litigation, and acquisition. Nuff said.