Samsung countersues Apple

4/22/2011 12:01 PM EDT

Is Apple getting saturated with novel innovation and looking for other means to protect them?

4/22/2011 1:43 PM EDT

There has been war of suing these days. Will companies be better off focusing on innovation or better off protecting their IPs?

4/22/2011 1:48 PM EDT

Perhaps, engineering community who contributes to innovation at Apple, may not be involved. But coommerial and legal side at Apple may be afraid of upcoming not so bright future and following this path of prection.

4/22/2011 2:10 PM EDT

If the patents should not be given for the look and feel, patents should only be given for the scientific researches. It is the nature working for all, if you find a nature's behavior and get it patented and use only for your benefit, that is against nature. Nature should be for all mankind. In other words I mean to say that patents laws needs completely redefined.

4/22/2011 3:31 PM EDT

Suing Samsung might be easy. How Apple is going to sue many copycats in China? I heard you could get copycat IPad in China at $100.

4/22/2011 8:11 PM EDT

Since the Galaxy products are essentially Android based, I don't understand why they chose to pick on Samsung. Why not Motorola or HTC?
Stupid...

4/23/2011 1:08 PM EDT

Selinz, I am pretty sure if Apple for any reason wins this case, they will definitely go after HTC, Motorola, etc....

4/24/2011 9:17 AM EDT

the lawyers smile and uncork the champagne. the engineers toil and the lawyers dine. everyone is ripping another person's technology. Apple should know that and stop this nonsesnce

4/25/2011 12:33 AM EDT

Is Apple getting old like Jobs? I thought they were very busy innovating, ah well, no company can do it all the time. Samsung like others copied the look and feel but that's not patentable in any way, is it? Oh c'mon, there are only so few ways one can realise a device which has a big LCD screen and some buttons and a camera, duh.

Guys, don't bother this is just another way to lead astray the Wall St bimbos.

4/25/2011 11:05 AM EDT

Neo1: You made a comment about only so many ways you can realize a device with a big LCD screen and a camera. The technology to implement these devices has been around for at least 5 years albeit at reduced capabilities. However, Apple is the company that conceptualized, implemented, and realized. To the comment about "natural way" .... since when did tablet computers become part of the natural environment? I think as EEs, we should not be so quick to NOT accept the originality, creativity, and usefulness of other disciplines work ... which is what you are doing here. There are many who believe things we do are pretty obvious but we get patents because they really are not that obvious or someone would have done it before.

4/26/2011 12:51 AM EDT

Apple's evil side looks darker than Microsoft's ever did. They are pathetic.

4/26/2011 5:06 AM EDT

Where is Motion Computing in all of Apple's look and feel frenzy? Motion Computing has been selling tablets for years before Apple even started one on the drawing board.
Apple can't sue on the form factor which is half the suit, the other half is iOS and Samsung is not using it.
Apple is just trying to suppress any competition in the market. Also Samsung is giving Apple preferential treatment of their products so if Apple truly doesn't want delays they will cool their heels.

4/26/2011 5:21 AM EDT

I get the feeling that Apple has backup plans in case Samsung stops making the processor for Apple or stops selling them memory devices. Apple is quite capable of quietly doing this while the whole world is busy discussing the lawsuit. Thoughts?

4/26/2011 6:28 AM EDT

@BalaLak

Well we have discussed before Apple's plans to work with TSMC on the baseband processor. Although Samsung's chip division still appears to be the monopoly supplier.

As to the rest of the debate, there seems to be a lot of frustration that companies take out patents and get engaged in tit-for-tat legal suits.

But that's what patents are there for. To build some sort of "position" around a techniques and technologies primarily as a COMMERCIAL lever.

Once a market gets large enough and a competitor threatening enough, it would be a dereliction of duty to the shareholders not to use those patents to try and slow that competition down. That's the patents' purpose.

And the fact is that patents are expensive to file and maintain and often seem to be granted for minutely detailed yet patently obvious reasons. But that's ok too because having them contested and found unenforceable still slows the competition down.

4/26/2011 3:08 PM EDT

Apple is using the fact the majority of people who are not into computers think they are the first to sell a tablet. Many companies have been producing them for a number of years before Apple. Fujitsu is also a large company that has been producing tablets for years. Even my Archos 9 came out before the iPad.

Apple is not about innovation, but instead about marketing. They've been good at selling over priced goods compared to the competition for years because their marketing department works very well.

Even their computers are nothing special, and yet people still buy them with 30-40% mark ups verses the competition who now since they use Intel is even easier to calculate and show how much above Apple prices out their products. Similar to how they sell iPhones for $638, with a BOM cost of less then 180$ something most other companies couldn't dream of doing.

So they have plenty of money to throw around in these suits whether or not they actually win.

4/30/2011 2:46 PM EDT

this patent war is so interesting...not always the one who is true wins but the one who has big bucks..