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The Apple-Samsung patent war took a new turn this week as a court in Seoul, the capital of South Korea, rejected claims of Samsung that Apple had violated three of its patents. This loss in the courts is significant for Samsung as it was unable to establish its claims even in its home country.
Seoul Central District Court judge Shim-Woo-Yong said the technology in two of Samsung’s patents at issue could easily be developed independently by others, and Apple did not violate the intellectual property rights of Samsung as the company claimed.
An elated Apple Inc. spokesman said, “We are glad the Korean court joined others around the world in standing up for real innovation and rejecting Samsung’s ridiculous claims.”
In the instant case, Samsung sued Apple in March 2012, claiming that Apple had illegally used three of Samsung’s patented technologies that were related to SMS in handheld devices. Samsung asked for an initial compensation of about $95,000 and a ban on sales of six iPhone and iPad models.
The court also found that a third patent on display of SMS from the same sender was not used in Apple’s iPad at all, but used Apple’s own proprietary iMessage application.
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On the issue of infringement of Samsung’s patent for a multitasking technology that prevents draft or incomplete messages from being lost when switching to another application, the judge said the existence of a similar technology used by Apple did not violate Samsung’s rights. On the other patent on accessing a message, the court said that a technology that allows users to access a notification box by touch can easily be developed by others.
Samsung has expressed disappointment with the ruling. The company said in a statement, “We will continue to take the measures necessary to protect our intellectual property rights,” indicating that the patent wars had no chance of abating any time soon.
