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Via Files Suit Against Apple

Posted by samzenpus on from the more-the-merrier dept.

crookedvulture writes "Add chipmaker Via to the list of companies filing legal suit against Apple. Via owns a number of fundamental technology patents inherited from Centaur, and it's already forced Intel to grant an ongoing x86 license. Via also has a vested interest; CEO Wenchi Chen is married to the head of HTC, which Apple sued for patent infringement last March."

13 of 262 comments (clear)

  1. Release the Kraken! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Surely Apple did not think that they were the only ones in the market with a patent portfolio.

    1. Re:Release the Kraken! by mug+funky · · Score: 4, Insightful

      if they were worried about their IP being stolen, perhaps they should manufacture in their own country... it's not like the USA is in need of more jobs or anything.

      people pay enough for their iToys that it wouldn't hurt apple too much - it'd be slow and steady growth rather than meteoric rise and then sue-town for the next 50 years.

    2. Re:Release the Kraken! by msauve · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Apple is playing a dangerous game. With their very limited range of products, they're much more exposed than most companies. Sue Samsung? Android and tablets are a small fraction of Samsung's business, they'd hardly notice if they were gone - if Apple's iOS were shut down for patent infringement (iPods and iPhones), they'd be screwed. HTC is more dependent on Android, but still has more to fall back on (proportionally) than Apple does.

      --
      "National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
    3. Re:Release the Kraken! by besalope · · Score: 5, Informative

      Except for the fact that they are the market leader. Name *ONE* mobile company doing better than Apple right now.

      They've only sued over things they believe they own, and the courts have agreed with them. They aren't trying to stop HTC or Samsung from making their own products, but they *are* trying to stop them from making products that are too much a clone of Apple's products.

      There are plenty of ways to make a multitouch phone and multitouch tablet. Apple chose their style. It's up to everyone else to choose their own as well.

      Except that at the OS level Android has eclipsed iOS with 2x the marketshare in 1Q11.

      As for phone manufacturers: Nokia (25%), Samsung (16%), and LG (5.6%) are all ahead of Apple (3.9%) in market share.

      As for styling, there's only so much you can do with a rectangular design with rounded corners.

    4. Re:Release the Kraken! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      if they were worried about their IP being stolen, perhaps they should manufacture in their own country... it's not like the USA is in need of more jobs or anything.

      Is it sad or funny? Complaining about Apple not manufacturing, when Steve Jobs started Next which did high tech manufacturing in the US, making really, really awesome computers... which people didn't buy because they preferred cheap imported goods and because nobody cared if the DoJ enforced antitrust laws against Microsoft who was breaking the law and undermining competition to prevent innovative companies like Next from being successful. The US had its chance at innovative, US based manufacture and pissed on it. Jobs learned better and went with foreign component suppliers when Next was acquired by Apple.

      Learn your geek history.

    5. Re:Release the Kraken! by MightyMartian · · Score: 4, Interesting

      I don't think Apple expects to permanently ban them from the market. It just wants to keep competitors wrapped up in court cases until Apple can scoop them with its newest offerings. I'm sure it knows full well most of its suits are sheer garbage that ultimately will fail. But ultimately could mean what? 6 to 24 months? Oh my, look at that, the iPad 3 and the iPhone 5 come out in those kinds of Windows, meanwhile the competition has a product to bring to a market but can't because of what amounts of a strategically placed nuisance suit.

      Of course, if Apple suddenly finds its own products being delayed in the same manner, or worse, but actual hard technology patents, then yes, they could seriously fuck themselves over. But that's fine. If everyone eventually ends this evil little war in a compromise, the consumer will win. I just hope all sides lose massive amounts of money in the process. Unfortunately, the lawyers will get rich(er).

      --
      The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
    6. Re:Release the Kraken! by QuantumLeaper · · Score: 4, Insightful

      What Black Bezels and round counters, is verbatim?

    7. Re:Release the Kraken! by tknd · · Score: 4, Insightful

      If everyone eventually ends this evil little war in a compromise, the consumer will win. I just hope all sides lose massive amounts of money in the process. Unfortunately, the lawyers will get rich(er).

      I don't understand how you come to this logic. Previously nobody was actively attacking each other with patent suits, Apple let the cat out of the bag, and now pretty much every player now has an extra line item called lawyer-ing up on their expense sheet as well as all future requirements having an additional risk item called "patent violation risk". Any engineer knows that the more requirements you tag on, the more expensive the product will get. But this one is a double-whammy because not only does the engineering team have to design in attempts to avoid/develop patents, but now the lawyer team gets bigger to defend against patent attacks.

      All this means is delayed products, less freedom for companies to develop products, and more stand-offs between companies. The consumer is never going to benefit. The products will be delayed or put off of the market. The next generation products will be more expensive. All future products will come with their own awkwardness just because of these patent wars.

      Consider this. The top two manufacturers for cameras, Canon and Nikon, don't name their "modes" identically though they should. Canon labels shutter mode "Tv". Nikon labels it "S". Additionally, the exposure bias meters are opposite. Nobody shares lens mounts. Each mfg makes their own. The result? You buy into a set of lenses and if you want to switch you have to sell all of your gear and go buy into a new set of lenses.

      Macs and Windows PCs had the same awkwardness too. ctrl+c for windows. cmd+c (alt key location for PCs) for macs.

      You can see this sort of non-sense going on everywhere in new technology. ebooks: Amazon kindle's only do kindle drm formats and pdfs, everyone else has their own drm format. All of the streaming video content services and random support with tvs and tv boxes (roku, boxee, apple tv, etc).

      It's a giant mess and the consumer definitely isn't winning. The consumer was in an awesome position back when we were still using vhs and cassette tapes. You could take that stupid tape and a gazillion different devices played it from that giant boom box, to the school's cheezy tape player, do your car radio. Same with vhs. These days? Fuck you.

      Apple knows this and they're trying to corner the market while they can. They don't want a race to the bottom but that's exactly what would benefit the consumer the most. While they certainly aren't the only company attempting this (sony and bluray, amazon and kindle, etc) they're certainly one of the most significant (ios apps).

  2. VIA doesn't have a vested interest, the CEO does. by Anonymous+Freak · · Score: 4, Insightful

    There is a difference.

    --
    Another non-functioning site was "uncertainty.microsoft.com."
    The purpose of that site was not known.
  3. The Phone Wars by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    In a galaxy far away, large corporate conglomerates wage battle to gain dominance in the vastness of space. The only hope of survival are a small, but pathetic force of Jedi nerds who resist the insidious marketing ploys and legal shenanigans of these dominating legal war mongrels. Will these Jedi nerds prevail? Stay tuned for continuing episodes of the Phone Wars.

    Other quotes:

    "These are not the phones you are looking for"

    "Apple. You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy"

  4. In this case by Sycraft-fu · · Score: 4, Informative

    It was Apple's mouth writing checks their ass can't cash. Apple is real worried: Android is a real threat to them. Their iDevice market is where their big profits are, they don't have a "what's next" lined up right now and Android is encroaching in a big way. In particular, HTC and Samsung have been since they've smoothed out android's UI and made it even more user friendly (if bloated).

    So Apple went all lawsuit happy. They want to suppress any competition. turns out, the competition isn't so happy about that and is hitting back. Hard. In the case of VIA part of it is the relation with HTC, the other part is I'm sure VIA has an interest in the tablet market. VIA has never done well at the high end and so has stopped trying, but they do low end pretty well. Maybe they want in to the tablet market.

    When you start suing everyone, expect to see the same in return.

  5. Re:Investors might sue? by chrb · · Score: 5, Informative

    Wen Chi Chen founded VIA Technologies in 1983, and has run the company for almost 30 years, building it from nothing into a billion dollar company that is now the world's largest independent manufacturer of motherboard chipsets. He is the Taiwanese equivalent of Steve Jobs. Under his stewardship VIA successfully defended a patent attack from Intel that led to 11 different court cases in 5 different countries (sound familiar?). The investors don't care about the family connection - they care about profit. And if VIA's patent portfolio was strong enough to convince Intel to settle, then what makes you think Apple will be any different? Intel holds many, many patents on fundamental CPU technologies; how many do you think Apple holds?

  6. Re:When did Apple partner with Microsoft? by Telvin_3d · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Everybody but Google banded together. Google was invited to join the same group. The explicit idea was to get them out of the way so no one could use them to sue anyone else. Google is the only one who refused to play along and tried to gain them independently. Shows who is serious about trying to avoid patent fights.