Hasta La Gadget!

Poor HTC. As if it didn’t already have enough to deal with, the troubled manufacturer now has to meddle with the original design of the One and other smartphones in order to avoid infringing on a couple of Nokia patents. According to the Wall Street Journal, HTC is currently working with Qualcomm to find a different method of improving reception and transmission within its radio components, following a successful patent suit by Nokia in the US a week ago. If these tweaks don’t happen, and if the ITC upholds Nokia’s victory when it considers the matter in January, a number of models could potentially be subject to import bans. This has happened before, however, when HTC unwittingly infringed on a Nokia microphone patent and quickly managed to find a workaround, so by now it has become adept at this sort of fire-fighting and says it already has a plan to avoid “business disruption.”

Filed under: Cellphones, Mobile, HTC, Nokia

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Source: Wall Street Journal

Despite that billion dollar verdict, the legal battle between Samsung and Apple continues, and the most recent happening comes from the ITC. Following up on an ITC administrative law judge’s ruling late last year finding that Samsung had infringed a few of Apple’s patented designs and tech, the Commission made its final determination today and issued a limited exclusion order for some Samsung devices. In its decision, the Commission found no violations of any of Apple’s design patents, and only found that Samsung infringed a pair of patents — patent number 7,479,949 for touchscreen technology, and patent number 7,912,501 for audio jack I/O circuitry. In doing so, the Commission stated that devices with workarounds to the asserted patents that were found not to infringe by the ALJ are not subject to the exclusion order.

As a result, offending Samsung devices are scheduled to be banned from importation after a 60-day presidential review period. During those two months, the devices can still be sold, but unless Obama steps up for Samsung in the same way he did for Apple in a separate ITC case, we won’t be seeing them stateside again. While we don’t have an exact list of the affected devices, we do know that the devices at issue are older models like the Continuum, the Transform and the Galaxy S II. So, consumers won’t feel much of an impact from the ban, but we bet Apple’s legal team will have a much more enjoyable weekend as a result of this latest win.

Update: Samsung has issued a statement on the matter, which can be found after the break

Filed under: Cellphones, Tablets, Mobile, Apple, Samsung

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Source: US ITC

Samsung had brought up a patent infringement matter against Apple at the U.S. ITC, its ruling would have resulted in a sales ban on a few old Apple devices that were found to infringe on various Samsung patents. After the ITC makes such a ruling, the U.S. President has a 60 day period to review it and if necessary, veto the ruling. That is exactly what happened in this case, the Administration handed down a veto against banning sales of Apple devices. South Korea, home to Samsung, has expressed its concerns over this decision made by the Obama Administration.

The South Korean Ministry of Trade, Industry & Energy released a statement today saying that they express “concerns” over the negative impact that this decision might have on the protection of patent rights. The Ministry urged the Administration to make “fair and reasonable decisions.” It should be kept in mind that Samsung might face a sales ban on some of its devices as well, since Apple is alleging that the company’s devices infringe on its patents. On this particular matter, the ITC is expected to make a decision by Friday.

South Korea Expresses Its Concerns Over U.S. Veto Of Apple Sales Ban original content from Ubergizmo.

The ITC recently gave a verdict on a matter brought up by Samsung, which claimed that Apple infringed on some of its patents. On Monday, a formal ban on sales of some older iPhone and iPad models was to go in place as a result of the iTC’s ruling. The U.S. President has a 60 day period to review the decision, and from now on, the ban on older Apple devices stands vetoed. The last time such an intervention was made by an administration against an ITC ruling was back in 1987.

U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman writes in the veto sent to ITC Chairman Irving Williamson that the administration made this decision considering the effect the ruling would have made on “competitive conditions in the U.S. economy and the effect on U.S. consumers.” Samsung said in a statement that it is “disappointed” that the ITC’s ruling has been vetoed, whereas Apple states that it applauds the administration for “standing up for innovation.” Both companies are actively pursuing legal action against each other on patent claims and that’s not going to end any time soon, but this is certainly a win for Apple.

ITC Ban On iPhone, iPad Sales Vetoed By Obama Administration original content from Ubergizmo.

Thought the ITC battle between Microsoft and Motorola over Microsoft’s email-based meeting patents was over? Think again. Despite winning an exclusion order (read: an import ban) on all MMI handsets infringing its patent, Microsoft has filed suit in the US District Court for the District of Columbia against US Customs and Border Protection (CBP), Customs Deputy Commissioner Thomas Winkowski, the Department of Homeland Security and Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano for failing to enforce the order. The complaint alleges that the defendants failed to do their jobs and allowed infringing devices to continue to be imported based upon claims and arguments Moto successfully made to US Customs — and Microsoft was neither privy to these discussions, nor given the opportunity to respond to Motorola’s claims. Essentially, Microsoft argues that Customs and Border Protection has both shirked its duties and made rulings in direct conflict with the ITC’s decision and order.

As such, Microsoft wants the court to rule that the CBP exceeded its legal authority, set aside the unlawful rulings set forth by CBP and compel it to enforce the ITC’s exclusion order. In addition to the complaint, Microsoft also filed for a Preliminary Injunction asking that the original ITC import ban be enforced immediately. We’ve yet to hear how the government will respond to these allegations, but we’ll keep you posted as things develop.

Filed under: Cellphones, Software, Mobile, Microsoft, Google

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Via: Bloomberg

Source: Complaint [PDF], Preliminary Injunction request [PDF]