Unless you’ve been living under a rock, or perhaps an oversized Android phone, the chances are you know that both Samsung and Apple have been at each other’s throats for some time now, with both claiming and counter-claiming all kinds of weird and wonderful things.
The latest battle in the over-arching war between the two giants is all about the iPhone 4S, with Samsung trying to stop Apple from being able to sell its latest smartphone in Italy, of all places.
Unsurprisingly, Apple isn’t so fond of that idea, and as such the pair have been slogging it out in the courts.
It appears that Apple has drawn first blood in this particular battle, after a judge in an Italian court ruled that Apple could indeed sell its iPhone 4S to eager buyers in the country, despite Samsung’s claims that the handset violates intellectual property rights.
Apple has continued to flagrantly violate our intellectual property rights and free ride on our technology. We believe it is now necessary to take legal action to protect our innovation.
Samsung is particularly upset at Apple’s use of wireless communications technology, which the Android and Windows Phone 7 partner claims infringes on two of their patents.
The infringed technology is essential to the reliable functioning of telecom networks and devices and Samsung believes that Apple’s violation as being too severe and that the iPhone 4S should be barred from sales.
The case isn’t quite over yet though. The Italian judge has accepted the request of both Apple and Samsung to be allowed to submit more evidence. That new evidence will be reviewed at a hearing on December 16th.
Apple had been set to bring the iPhone 4S to Italy on Friday, which can now go ahead as planned, with pre-orders having begun last week. Someone at Apple was clearly confident that they were not going to be forced to postpone a launch worth millions of dollars.
Samsung will now continue in its efforts to have the iPhone 4S banned in other countries, including Japan and Australia, after Apple was successful in getting the Galaxy Tab 10.1 banned from being made available to Australian customers already.
Why can’t we all just get along?
(via PCMag)
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