Behind the scenes are interesting, isn’t it? Here is a leaked ‘redacted’ reports, which Apple would not like at all. These reports are from the Samsung and Apple debacle, showing some interesting behind-the-scenes pre-litigation action by the two companies. Once again a leak in the tech world, is against Apple. This week, U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh, had ruled that while Samsung may not be immune from a wider patent suit, it will not have sales of its products banned in the United States.
Accidentally, the judge’s ruling was leaked in full, which paved path for criticism for Apple’s working. One would always want to prevent such ’secrets’ from the court ruling from reaching the outside world, especially the companies’ competitors.
Moreover, the secrets were not just viewed by a few, but viewers of the document had sufficient time to highlight the redacted version of the ruling. They used the Copy-Paste option to paste it into a text editor to reveal the blacked out sections to the entire world. This would definitely displease Apple.
Apple would still feel relieved as not many ‘juicy’ secrets were revealed. CNET had a post, pointing out the revelation in brief, but Roger Cheng, the author of the post, admitted that the revelation had no ‘juicy’ secrets UNFORTUNATELY.
Nonetheless, there are a few interesting facts to note, which relate to Apple and Samsung. In general, the leak had how the smartphone maker is playing out, along with other details such as to how Apple works with other companies to license its patented technology.
A detailed analysis of the available information from the unredacted reports can be read as below:
To start with Apple’s claims, it was noted that the tech giant claimed that Samsung is no threat to its business. But with a rigorous clash with Samsung specifically, Apple displayed a half-worry that Samsung along with Android has the potential to dominate the market. To some extent, Samsung has proved that point right.
Again, Apple boasted that its current customers would be unlikely to switch to a Samsung smartphone. Studies here accurately prove the same, as Samsung potentially would take market share away from other manufacturers, leaving out the Apple share. Loyalty in case of Apple is a hard switch.
On the other hand, Samsung had its argument that Apple’s supply cannot keep up with the demand that the iPhone presents. Basically, it meant that Apple is selling more than the company can manufacture. Apple had however, presented evidence that it had been able to do consistently beforehand, which made Koh deem that the claims made by Samsung were “dubious”.
Notably, Samsung is still an integral part of Apple as they supply Apple with mobile processors; a partnership it has maintained as a crucial source of revenue for the Korean giant even amidst a global patent conflict.
There was a small footnote, which had a bigger appeal. It suggested that while Apple brought suits against Samsung for ‘utility’ patents, “it does not appear” that design patents were discussed during the preceding litigation. The ‘utility’ patents were related to such items as networking, as well as design patents.
In a related development, it was even known that Apple had already licensed the patent to Nokia and IBM. This has played a crucial role in how iPads and iPhone scrolled through documents and image. Nokia had even settled the case via an agreement, wherein Apple had to shell out $600 million as part of the agreement. The same was publicly announced.