backtop

Print 22 comment(s) - last by Cheesew1z69.. on Nov 24 at 6:30 PM
Disclosure could give Samsung leverage when bargaining with Apple, help it stay ahead

When it comes to sales only one Android OEM has passed Apple, Inc. (AAPL) in U.S. sales.  In fact, Samsung Electronics Comp., Ltd. (KSC:005930) has left Apple far behind in sales; in some quarters its top handset outsold Apple's only handset (the iPhone).  Meanwhile Samsung is the only Android OEM to be strongly profitable, although it still trails the lower volume Apple in profits.

Given that state of affairs, it perhaps makes a bit more sense why Samsung has been Apple's number one target in court.  So far Apple and Samsung are one and one.  In the UK Apple lost a major case to Samsung and was forced to print an apology ad; meanwhile in the U.S. a jury went the opposite way finding Samsung guilty of $1.05B USD in "willful infringement" (that case is being appealed).

Now even as Apple and Samsung lock horns for a second trial, U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California's San Jose courtroom Judge Paul S. Grewal has made a key ruling which may give Samsung leverage at the bargaining table.  In a court order on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, Judge Grewal ordered [PDF] that Apple had to disclose the terms of its intellectual property cross-licensing agreement with HTC Corp. (TPE:2498).

Apple v. Samsung
Apple will have to give fiscal details of its licensing agreement with HTC to Samsung.
[Image Source: Gizmodo]

Apple and HTC settled up earlier this month, with Apple reportedly getting less than half what Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) gets in Android licensing fees.  The licensing deal is set to last for 10 years.

The Cupertino company, despite having a stacked, high-power litigation team likely settled with HTC in part because HTC is struggling in sales and isn't much of a threat.  Now it may regret cutting a relatively reasonable deal with the Asian OEM, as it may look unfair and uncooperative to the judge and jury, should it reject a similar statement by Samsung.

According to reports while Microsoft squeezed only $10 USD per handset from HTC, it gets 50 percent more -- roughly $15 USD per handset -- from Samsung.

The document in question has been labeled "Attorneys-Eyes-Only", so it is unlikely the media will get their hands on the exact licensing details; particularly after Samsung was already admonished in the last round for allegedly leaking Apple court filings to the press.

An injunction hearing will be held on Dec. 6, at which point a California district judge will decide on whether to temporarily ban U.S. sales of Apple's iPhone 5 and/or Samsung's Galaxy S III, in addition to other Samsung "Jelly Bean" products.

Source: Judge Grewal via SBNation [The Verge]


Comments     Threshold


This article is over a month old, voting and posting comments is disabled
RE: Extremely bad
By dark matter on 11/23/2012 5:37:44 AM , Rating: 2
Whilst your insulting the other writer for not being able to run a business, I feel I need to remind you that you don't understand the word "context".

No doubt, you're an absolute astute businessman, with many businesses under your belt.

No imagine you own shop A, and across the street is shop B.

And at the end of the drive is shop X.

Now, how would you feel if you're business was told to stop selling by shop X, because what you're selling is killing his business, and only he can sell his product.

Yet at the same time you see shop owner X and shop owner B making a deal over the same product he's tried to get you to stop selling.

You're the one obviously never run a business. Because ANY businessman worth his salt would be demanding to see the content of the deal between X and B.

Idiot.


RE: Extremely bad
By retrospooty on 11/23/2012 7:08:08 AM , Rating: 4
"No imagine you own shop A, and across the street is shop B.
And at the end of the drive is shop X. Now, how would you feel if you're business was told to stop selling by shop X, because what you're selling is killing his business, and only he can sell his product. Yet at the same time you see shop owner X and shop owner B making a deal over the same product he's tried to get you to stop selling. You're the one obviously never run a business. Because ANY businessman worth his salt would be demanding to see the content of the deal between X and B."

Exactly... I would only add - If Apple wants to keep the courts out of its business than Apple should STOP involving the courts in its business. Plain and simple.


RE: Extremely bad
By Retrospotting on 11/23/2012 7:21:55 PM , Rating: 1
go stick your finger up your arse dude and suck on it.


RE: Extremely bad
By Cheesew1z69 on 11/24/2012 8:23:03 AM , Rating: 2
How classy Pirks...

You are a real winner....


RE: Extremely bad
By retrospooty on 11/24/2012 1:31:57 PM , Rating: 3
LOL. Can you imagine having so little of a life that you actually take the time to create an email address, then a new ID just to add zero to the debate? Now he has done it several times to me, you and reclaimer...

It's really kind of sad. Maybe this person wasn't loved as a child... And certainly isn't loved now.


RE: Extremely bad
By Cheesew1z69 on 11/24/2012 6:30:17 PM , Rating: 3
I don't think he has ANY life at all.

Sad part is, he claims to have children, or so I thought I read. I feel pity for his children and wife if he actually does. The way he acts, is quite pathetic for an adult.


RE: Extremely bad
By Shadowself on 11/23/2012 2:08:16 PM , Rating: 2
If you think I was insulting the previous poster, and that was not my intent but rather to cast his post in the context of not knowing how businesses really work, then you have no little knowledge of what an insulting post really is (but for an example see the last line of your own post). Clearly you have no personal knowledge of the flame wars that used to erupt many years ago and virtually are non existent today. A bit of context might be helpful.

And, actually, I have run a business (actually, I've done a couple of start ups) and I have been an advisor to a few of businesses that I didn't start. And even the startups are/were not little businesses. In one the largest funding from a single source was $1.5 billion and the largest single contract, so far, was $500 million.

I'd say I know how to run a business.

The issue is not as simple as the situation you portray. The issue is that shop X has been granted a legal right to be the only one to sell products with specific features/capabilities -- that it has never pledged to share with everyone. (I'm not going to get into whether I think shop X should have been granted that legal right in the first place. I think I've made my stance on that quite clear in previous threads: virtually all systems and methods patents should be killed.)

Shop X legally could (and in some cases has) been able to stop both shop A and shop B from selling products with those features. Then for some reason, a reason that both shop B and shop X are willing to share with shop A, shop X is willing to license those features with shop B. The financial dealings of that sharing is purely between shop X and shop B.

So the court has said that the details of the agreement between shop X and shop B must be 100% shared with shop A. My question comes to this... and EVERYONE is ignoring it in an effort to bash shop X -- where does this stop? Does shop A get to demand copies of every even remotely similar agreement between shop X and anyone else? Does shop A get to demand copies of every even remotely similar agreement between shop B and everyone else?

In my case both of my two biggest startups have critical patents. Patents we have not licensed to anyone. Right now, no one can build what we build. Other companies has tried to get the rights to do it and have lost. They've even tried to invalidate the patents and have lost.

However, if we licensed those patents to Lockheed Martin, and only Lockheed Martin, to build similar products, do Orbital Sciences, Space Systems Loral, Raytheon, Arianespace, etc. get the right to see all the details of that patent license agreement?

And bye-the-bye, I've been called an idiot by much better people than you.


"My sex life is pretty good" -- Steve Jobs' random musings during the 2010 D8 conference











botimage
Copyright 2013 DailyTech LLC. - RSS Feed | Advertise | About Us | Ethics | FAQ | Terms, Conditions & Privacy Information | Kristopher Kubicki