Hasta La Gadget!

In with a bang, out with a whimper. After making us fear for the Xbox 360’s (shelf) life by delivering an adverse ruling in Motorola’s ITC patent infringement case against Microsoft last year, the presiding Administrative Law Judge reversed his stance a couple months ago after prodding by the full Commission. While the finding of non-infringement was good news for Microsoft, the decision still needed to be OK’d by the Commission before the investigation could be officially closed. We thought we weren’t going to get a final ruling until later in the summer, but the ITC apparently agreed with the ALJ’s initial ruling ahead of schedule, and has decided not to review the decision today. As a result, the investigation is now closed, and this particular battle in the patent wars is finally over.

Update: Naturally Microsoft Corporate VP and deputy General Counsel David Howard is excited to see this case be closed, and issued the following statement:

This is a win for Xbox customers and confirms our view that Google had no grounds to block our products.

Filed under: Mobile, Microsoft, Google

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Via: Reuters

Source: USITC [PDF]

This just hasn’t been Samsung’s summer. On top of Apple winning its earliest civil lawsuit against Samsung, the International Trade Commission has just handed out an initial determination that Apple didn’t violate any of four Samsung patents (including two reportedly standards-essential examples) by offering the iPad and iPhone. While Judge James Gildea didn’t publicly outline why Apple was in the clear, he added that Samsung lacks a domestic business that uses the patents — important when it’s trying to claim economic harm in the US. The verdict still gives Samsung at least four months’ room to breathe while the ITC reviews the decision, but it’s hard to see Samsung enjoying the reduced offensive strength when it’s already on the defensive in American courtrooms.

Filed under: Cellphones, Tablets, Mobile

ITC says Apple didn’t violate four Samsung patents with iPad, iPhone originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 14 Sep 2012 16:06:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Motorola filed its most recent ITC complaint against Apple so late into last week that the court system couldn’t immediately provide more details; we’re only just seeing documents now that the weekend is over. As it stands, the case involves seven patents that mostly touch on staple technologies of the modern mobile world, such as syncing messages between devices and bookmarking media playback on one device to resume on another. Does that last technique sound familiar? You might recall it being a cornerstone of the movie and podcast support that Apple has implemented since 2005. Despite reaching that far back into history, Motorola is just as eager to modernize the targeted hardware list to keep its complaints relevant — the current iPad, the iPhone 4S and other devices are at risk of a trade ban, posing more of a threat to Apple’s bottom line than the dust-covered (and near-finished) initial legal challenge from October 2010. Before coming to any conclusions, though, remember that the newer complaint isn’t likely to have any speedy resolution of its own. Past ITC cases have usually taken a year and a half to complete, which could leave most or all of today’s technology as another distant memory.

Filed under: Cellphones, Desktops, Laptops, Tablet PCs

Motorola’s latest ITC complaint against Apple targets newer iOS devices and Macs, messaging and sync originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 20 Aug 2012 22:04:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Rambus has lost the ITC dispute it filed with most of the electronics industry back in the day. Only LSI and STMicroelectronics remained as respondents after the company negotiated settlements with Freescale, Broadcom, MediaTek and NVIDIA. In its decision, the court found that some of the patents were unenforceable, while others ceased to be under the “clean hands” doctrine because Rambus had allegedly destroyed relevant documents. Company general counsel, Thomas Lavelle, has said in a statement that its next move might be to make an appeal to the Federal Circuit — where it’s hoping for better luck.

Continue reading Rambus planning appeal after losing ITC patent case against LSI and STMicroelectronics

Filed under: Misc. Gadgets

Rambus planning appeal after losing ITC patent case against LSI and STMicroelectronics originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 26 Jul 2012 13:43:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Just like they have been, products like the One X and EVO 4G LTE will continue to pour through US Customs, as the ITC has now denied Apple’s request for an emergency ban against the alleged infringing products. The news follows Apple’s request for an emergency ban itself, in which the Cupertino outfit accused HTC of making false statements in order to bypass the terms of an exclusion order issued last December. In the most recent ruling, the ITC found that, “Apple has not demonstrated the propriety of temporary emergency action,” and went on to state, “the commission will not direct Customs to detain all subject HTC products because the commission does not have the information necessary to determine whether the respondents are currently violating the commission’s limited exclusion order.” Just yesterday, the ITC began an investigation to determine whether HTC’s products continue to violate a patent held by Apple, which would be a violation of December’s exclusion order. Until the ITC issues a more definitive finding, however, it seems that HTC can breathe a sigh of relief.

ITC denies Apple’s request for emergency ban against HTC products originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 02 Jul 2012 22:28:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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