Apple Found Not Guilty Vs Samsung In Initial ITC Ruling
The Apple vs Samsung (and vice versa) legal battle continues with Apple being found not guilty in an initial ruling this week in infringing four Samsung patents with the iPhone and iPad. The patents being spoken about here include technology connected with CDMA and UMTS mobile devices as well as a method for dialing a smartphone and a the manipulation of digital documents. Judge Gildea who presides over this case has made it clear that he finds no violation in respect to any of the asserted claims at this time.
It's been ruled that Samsung has not shown any domestic industry for any of the four patents and that such a finding would be necessary for Apple to have done anything wrong legally. This ruling with the ITC requires that a domestic industry exist in order to rule against a party. Would that Samsung have provided the requirements here, they may have been able to ban the iPad and iPhone from import – but that's beside the point since there's no Industry where one does not exist, so to speak.
This determination is still able to be reviewed by the six-member Commission that makes up the decision-making body of the ITC. The claims in this case deal with the following items, thus says Foss Patents this week:
Claims 75-76 and 82-84 of U.S. Patent No. 7,706,348 on an "apparatus and method for encoding/decoding transport format combination indicator in CDMA mobile communication system" (an allegedly UMTS-essential patent)
Claims 9-16 of U.S. Patent No. 7,486,644 on a "method and apparatus for transmitting and receiving data with high reliability in a mobile communication system supporting packet data transmission" (allegedly UMTS-essential)
Claims 5, 9-10 and 13 of U.S. Patent No. 6,771,980 on a "method for dialing in a smart phone"
Claims 1-5 of U.S. Patent No. 7,450,114 on "user interface systems and methods for manipulating and viewing digital documents"
This is part of a grand war between the two giant hardware companies, both of them having massive stakes in the mobile industry and one whole heck of a lot to lose. Apple recently won a giant case vs Samsung in the USA that resulted in $1.5 billion in damages for mobile patents as well. Stay tuned as these companies keep up the boxing for some time to come!