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Apple Says Samsung 3G Patents Violate RAND Requirements
judgecorp writes "The patent dispute between Samsung and Apple has finally boiled down to clear understandable terms. Samsung says Apple has not been paying it royalties for use of patented 3G technology. Apple says Samsung smuggled that technology into the 3G standards, disclosing its IP demands later. The Dutch court will rule on 14 October."
The issue at hand now seems to be whether Apple already has a license to the patents under the 3G "Reasonable and Non-Discriminatory" requirements for patented technology used in the standard. If Samsung really believes Apple needs a separate license, when can we expect them to sue everyone else?
Why would they sue anyone else? Apple attacked them, they're countersuing. They're under no obligation to sue anyone else and from their history there's no reason to assume they will.
...who wants to block sales of a device because it has rounded corners.
The tab ultimately got temporarily banned because of the gallery application: It is not allowed to display thumbnails, that when tapped are displayed fullscreen, where it is then possible to scroll horizontally to the next/previous.
My point is: Apple is a hypocrite.
Yes, I know there is no way around RAND patents and that there IS a way around rounded corners, but it's equally absurd.
"Apple says Samsung smuggled that technology into the 3G standards, disclosing its IP demands later."
Where have I heard that one before?
When they try to enforce a patent on a slightly modified geometric shape that there is prior art for in a 40+ year old movie and 25 year old television programs.
Are they hoping that, should Samsung fall, all the other Android phone manufacturers will immediately settle?
Apple tried to differentiate their product through litigation and they believed their own press that they were the baddest bully on the block.
They've forgotten their own history that every time they try to litigate something HUGE, they lose and they lose a big chuck of what legal protections they have.
For example, think of the look-and-feel suit against Microsoft many years ago. Apple thought they were the big bully, and Microsoft beat them like a drum.
Apple should concentrate more on getting the iPhone 5 out and less on worrying about Samsung selling a tablet in Europe.
Replies to this thread will be based on the type of phone in your pocket. The OP has an iphone.
Here is a comment I already made on another web site about this issue:
There is something that many people seem to be missing about FRAND patents. While the terms of FRAND licensing agreements are rarely released, it is widely believed that companies that license their patents through FRAND usually require a cross-licensing agreement with the licensee. This makes sense: why should you be forced to allow other companies to license your hard-earned technologies for a relatively low price only to allow those companies to come back and sue the dick off of you? Requiring a cross-license agreement from all licensees sounds extremely Fair, Reasonable, and Non-Discriminatory to me.
However, it is also widely believed that Apple wants to license the FRAND patents WITHOUT allowing other companies to cross-license Apple's patents. This belief was bolstered by the fact that the only term of Apple's settlement agreement with Nokia over FRAND patents that was released to the public was the fact that Nokia relented and allowed Apple to license their FRAND patents without a cross-licensing agreement. This made sense in that particular case because most of Apple's patents in the mobile arena are software patents related to elements of iOS. Since Nokia is moving towards WP7 and Microsoft already has a cross-licensing agreement with Apple and indemnifies all hardware manufacturers of WP7, it didn't make sense for Nokia to continue an expensive protracted legal battle with Apple over something that was quickly becoming irrelevant. However, Samsung is in a completely different position from Nokia and they aren't going to give in nearly as easily. Game on!
(posting AC because I'm at work...)
I'll be very curious to see how the hordes of Apple haters/Samsung cheerleaders spin this as anything even vaguely good. If Samsung successfully strongarms more money out of Apple for F/RAND patents, then the _ENTIRE INDUSTRY_ will be at danger of the same thing which is 100% counter to the core concept of F/RAND patents in industry standard technologies. You may hate Apple (as seems so popular on /. lately); you may hate that they're defending their IP rights (or disagree that they should have been given the right to protect those IP rights to begin with); you may think a lot of things, but I think only a fool would think that Samsung being successful in this effort is a good thing.
That's it. I really don't have anything else to say.
I don't respond to AC's.
Samsung is being treating everyone who ISN'T suing them in the same non-discriminatory manner.
d
all language nazi's will burne in heil!
FRAND exists to enable industry standards. Companies agree to subject a subset of their intellectual property to FRAND in order to make that technology part of a standard--those companies get money from licensing fees for those technologies from other manufacturers (who *must* use that technology in order to implement the standard). Some of the licensees might choose to sign cross-licensing agreements in lieu of some of that money, just like they might choose to pay in frequent flyer miles or beer.
Having some technology included in a telecommunications standard (like GSM/LTE/etc.) doesn't somehow give you free license to every other piece of intellectual property from every licensee. Put simply, owning the patent on some nuance of GSM shouldn't give Samsung the right to make nearly identical copies of iPads. That's not how the system works or has ever worked for anyone ever in the history of mankind ever. It is clearly stupid and if the situation was reversed then you would be screaming bloody murder.
But the situation isn't reversed, because Apple owns technology on multiple standards (firewire, thunderbolt, etc.), you never see them insisting on cross-licensing in order for someone to implement those standards.
Perhaps you shouldn't hang out on a tech website?
> Apple just re-release stuff with Apple logos and claim they invented it
What they hell are you talking about?
>> If Samsung really believes Apple needs a separate license, when can we expect them to sue everyone else?
I doubt it. I think it's a tax specifically reserved for those who abuse patents. Win or lose, this should give Apple some pause the next time they feel like using patents to prevent fair competition.
Bonus for us - it ties up a portion of Apple's lawyers, who would undoubtedly be working on attacks against other small players.
With the community design in the EU there will be only one maker of any particular shape of thing. Only Apple iPads unless it isn't a tablet. Everyone will be robbed of stylish clothing because there will be only one maker of each shirt, pant, dress, skirt, blouse, gown, etc. The fashion industry will come crashing down. Furniture makers will have only one design of each piece of furniture because someone else will already have all other possible designs protected. Books and book covers. Cutlery. Plates. Everything you can think of will have only one design from one maker. People will stop buying because there won't be any choice. This law is a suicide pill for an economy. It's patently absurd.
Is the fact apple lied to a German court and submitted doctored images to keep the galaxy S off store shelves. So now Samsung decided to play the court game to and Apple is now crying foul of the rules they used in the game.
What if those terms include things like "you must assign to me all revenue you make from selling anything with a fruit-based logo on it"? Motorola and Nokia will happily agree because the cost to them for that term is $0, for Apple the cost is $100 Billion. Are those FRAND terms?
Nope? what's the difference?
Samsung may have signed some cross-licensing agreements with other companies for IP reasonably valued at millions, and now they want Apple to hand over IP reasonably valued at billions--that's not non-discriminatory.
Idiot.
I don't think it means what you think it means
The very idea of "using patents defensively" is one of the greatest illustations of how evil the current patent regime has become.
Likewise, the GNU project developed copyleft as a way of using copyrights defensively because RMS considered copyrights in computer programs evil. It's just a lot easier to avoid infringing a copyright than a patent because unlike patent infringement, copyright infringement requires having had access to the plaintiff's work.
> when can we expect them to sue everyone else?
This seems like FUD to me. Samsung and Apple are in a deathlock. It doesn't matter who started it. Samsung may well sue the hell outta everyone in existence, but until they go after, say, HTC, my money is that they're holding onto the patent for defensive purposes. In other words, there's no special reason to assume Samsung is going to go after other manufacturers until, well, they do. If I'm wrong, lawyers will get a little richer.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
Sorry but it's true. This is 100% Apple's fault. I think we all know that Samsung would not have sued Apple, were it not for Apple's shameful patent trolling.
You can only design register things that have no function and are not needed for compatibility. The German case has to be based on design features that are not a necessary part of a tablet. In fact, Apple will need to prove that their design features add no value beyond aesthetics.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
Take the garment industry. For generations designers have come out with new designs each season and the mass market copies these new styles. The designer still makes her money on the real thing and the mass market producers satisfy demand for the style. Without the mass market producers making new styles available to the masses, new styles can't become popular. If new styles don't become popular the rich won't wear them either so the designers will lose their customers also. In the garment industry, protecting rights to designs hurts everyone including the designer. Not protecting designs keeps a healthy garment industry constantly renewing itself. When there is too much protection in the market place, no one can sell anything. The EU has opened that door and law suits are about the flood through it. Everyone will be protecting whatever they make and trying to stop everyone else from making the same thing. Everyone will be suing everyone else and the market place will come to a complete stand still. It is starting in electronics with phones and tablets but will quickly move to fashion and every other portion of the market. It won't take long, it just takes one company to start doing it and everyone will have no choice but to follow.
Do you think Samsung is saying, "hey, we got $10M worth of IP in exchange for this license from other licensees--please give us $10M or the equivalent"? Because that's not what is happening.
Samsung is asking for IP which Apple values in the billions (i.e., the rights to make iPad copies) in exchange for a license to technology which Samsung previously agreed to offer under F/RAND terms as part of an industry standard, Apple wants to pay the same in absolute value as the other licensees.
and that places the value of Apple's products in the billions. It doesn't matter if you disagree.
Here's a question, yes or no. Should Samsung be allowed to make literal copies of Apple products in exchange for Apple licensing technology built into an industry standard?
That presupposes Apple had a design worth patenting and also patentable to start with.
How about something like this dating back form March 2006:
http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/09/samsung-digital-picture-frame-stores-pics-movies-music/
Striking resemblance isn't it?
That came out before the iPhone in 2007 even.
It is Apple that copies everything, then patents it, and forces feeble minds to drink their Kook-Aid, turning them into drones, Apple Invented Everything! Apple Patented Everything! It is Magical!..
According to the wikipedia page on FRAND:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FRAND
The actual forbidden behavior is "requiring licensees to license their own IP to the licensor for free (free grant backs)". No one has suggested that Samsung wanted a free grant back, only to negotiate terms for cross licensing.
All you iTards seriously need to drink less Kool-Aid...
Unfortunately, banning the munition as you describe would have the opposite effect that you desire. It would allow anybody anywhere to outprice, outmarket you before you have a chance to develop the new tech sufficiently. Patents were created for good reasons, despite the fact that they (like much of the legal system) have been messed up. I don't know if change for the better will occur, and I'm not even sure what the better would be in detail, but banning patents would not be better.
It's easier to be a result of the past, but more fun to be a cause of the future! http://www.spacefinancegroup.com/
I guess IDIOTS like you forget that the judge made his decision after actually handling the two devices for hours.
And also completely ignore the fact that 2 allegedly scaled photos out of over 120 does not make the more than obvious copying a legal action.
If what apple says is true, i.e., the patent was inside a standard and later Samsung raised it to claim money, there is precedent that the case will get thrown out. In an earlier case of QCOMM vs BRCM, the Qualcomm patents were disqualified as they were patented prior to the standard and were introduced into the standard without revealing that they have a patent on that topic.
So much hypocrisy in this forum... No, Apple is not going after Samsung just because of the round corners. There are many other tablets with round corners, after which Apple is not going, for some reason. I can't remember ever going to a nearby BestBuy store and thinking "wow, this iPad looks weird..." about something that upon closer inspection turns out to NOT be iPad, until I saw the Galaxy 10.1. Only a blind person will argue that it's not "inspired" to a very high degree by iPad. And if you consider other things Samsung has done (a Galaxy phone power adapter being nearly 100% identical copy of Apple's iPhone adapter, using Apple App Store and Safari icons in its brick and mortar stores being the latest publicized examples) - it does make one wonder what's going on here.
As far as the tablet designs are concerned, isn't that curious that only after the iPad came out all these "there's no other way to make a tablet" arguments begun? Of course there's isn't, now that Apple has shown it! It's how it's always been: right as soon as someone comes up with a brilliant idea - "it's so obvious!" - and yet, nobody came up with that obvious idea before. Curious, isn't it? Yet, Microsoft had some interesting ideas about a tablet design that's nowhere near iPad's (which never realized, I might add). Their recently shown Mango UI is completely different from iPad's. It's weird for me to say so, but Microsoft really did innovate there, instead of going the easy way, as Samsung did.
HP's Touchpad and RIM's Playbook are two other examples - both different from iPad. Both had great potential, but lacked the polish that Apple has put in their iPad and iOS. They both failed, but not because they were bad - they failed because the companies that made them were being lazy.
I love my iPad. But I also LOVED both the Playbook and the Touchpad, and was considering buying one of them (although couldn't quite make my mind up which one :) ). I was leaning more towards the Playbook, being somewhat familiar with the QNX, but it's lack of an email client was a deal breaker for me (as well as pretty poor developer support). And that's one of the reasons it's failing. And HP's decision to abandon the Touchpad was a bummer as well. So both of them failed because of one or another stupid decisions made by the companies that produced them. And neither of them were imilar to the iPad to a degree to which Samsung's Galaxy Tab is.
So we now have at least _three_ different tablet approaches, clearly indicating it's not just about the "round corners". Two of them failed for reasons NOT related much to how they look or work. Another may or may not succeed. And then we have Samsung Galaxy Tab. Not a bad tablet, mind you - in fact the best Android tablet (and I wanna say "the only one worth looking at") by any means. But a copycat nonetheless.
Here are some links from this very article comments, collected for your (in)covenience.
I hope you can find which one corresponds to which one of the points you all keep repeating.
Nobody has ever invented anything. Everything is just a refinement or combination of existing technologies.
Seriously, name one invention by any company ever.
You are too stupid to understand what I was trying to explain to you.
IEEE-1394 is a standard which exists with some Apple patents thrown in under FRAND terms. Anyone can build using IEEE-1394 and Apple doesn't insist on reciprocal access to all of the licensees intellectual property as a condition. That's how things are supposed to work.