Seeks billions in damages and an injunction against the flagship Android 4.0 phone
One measure of how quickly events are unfolding in the smartphone patent wars is the number of typos appearing in Florian Mueller's FOSS Patents dispatches. The German-born blogger's coverage of the "thermonuclear war" Steve Jobs promised to unleash against Google's (GOOG) Android operating system are closely read by all sides in the cross-continental disputes, and lately he's hardly had time to breathe, never mind spellcheck.
"There's just too much going on these days," he wrote in the second of two long reports filed Saturday, "and contrary to popular misbelief (which I've seen on Twitter), I do sleep."
As Mueller sees it, the subject of his two latest reports, a pair of federal lawsuits filed by Apple (AAPL) in two California district courts, are signal events that could turn the tide in Cupertino's favor.
Galaxy Nexus
In the Northern District: In the first suit, Apple is asking for a preliminary injunction against the Galaxy Nexus -- the official "Ice Cream Sandwich" lead device developed by Samsung in close cooperation with Google -- based of four court-tested "high-powered" patents that Mueller dubs the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.
Google's decision to keep using one of them -- the so-called "data detector" patent -- in the latest version of Android, even after the U.S. International Trade Commission ruled that an HTC Android phone had infringed it is, in Mueller's words, "unfair vis-à-vis HTC..., snubs Apple, and shows disregard for intellectual property in general and the ITC in particular. This is a case of willful, extremely reckless infringement."
In the Southern District: Here Apple is trying to shut down Motorola Mobility's (MMI) legal strategy -- endorsed implicitly and "irrevocably" last week by Google, which is about to purchase MMI -- of blocking sales of iPhones in Germany on the grounds that they infringe industry-standard broadband patents that Motorola pledged years ago to license to all comers on so-called FRAND (fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory) terms. Motorola licensed the patents to chipmaker Qualcomm (QCOM) and that license would normally extend, by the principle of "patent exhaustion," to a company like Apple that buys Qualcomm chips.
But in an exchange of letters revealed in Apple's suit, Motorola asked Qualcomm "to terminate any and all license and covenant rights with respect to Apple, effective February 10, 2011."
Mueller writes that "even though Qualcomm may benefit from weak patent exhaustion defenses in other situations because it is a major patent holder who could do a lot of 'double-dipping', it appears that it supports Apple, and I don't think that's just because Apple is a customer. I think it's most likely because MMI's discriminatory termination relating to only Apple is, quite probably, unjustifiable and ineffectual."
"If it's true that patent exhaustion is a valid defense in Apple's favor," Mueller concludes, "Google-MMI is playing with fire here." Apple was forced to temporarily remove the iPhone 3G and 4 from its German online store based on Motorola's FRAND complaint, and now sales of the iPhone 4S could be at risk. The company is seeking damages that could run to many billions of dollars.
Both cases are getting extensive coverage in the trade press -- for example at AppleInsider here and here -- but for their detail, deep expertise and passion, we recommend Mueller's reports, typos and all. See here and here.
It's not enough that Google borrowed the phone's look and feel to make Android?
From Google's IEEE letter. Source: FOSS Patents. Click to enlarge.
It took a Techmeme news cycle for the import of Google's (GOOG) letter to the IEEE -- the nonprofit organization that sets technical standards for everything from AC/DC converters to Wi-Fi networks -- to sink in.
Early reports praised the company for joining Apple (AAPL) and Microsoft (MSFT) MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Feb 9, 2012 6:02 AM ET
A blogger uncovers the $2 billion dispute behind Friday's bizarre back and forth
Source: FOSS Patents
Apple (AAPL) watchers were shocked Friday when the company, in response to a court-ordered injunction, removed the iPhone 4 and 3GS from its online Apple Store in Germany.
The injunction was suspended before the end of the day -- and the products restored -- but the bizarre incident left analysts and investors wondering what the hell MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Feb 4, 2012 11:25 AM ET
Apple forced to pull older iPhones off its online store, faces an injunction on push e-mail
Yanked from the virtual shelves
UPDATE: Sales of Apple's iPhones resumed Friday. See here.
- - -
It was a crazy day for Apple (AAPL) in Germany.
First it removed the iPhone 4 and 3GS from its German online store -- the first time, as far as we know, that the company has been forced to stop selling MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Feb 3, 2012 10:56 AM ET
New analysis suggests the payoff could be seven fold greater if it holds out for a win
Click to enlarge.
In a note to clients issued Monday, Deutsche Bank's Chris Whitmore lists four possible outcomes of the patent wars being fought in courts around the world between Apple (AAPL) and the Google (GOOG) Android ecosystem:
1) settlement with per unit license fee paid to Apple;
2) a more favorable outcome where Apple MORE
HTC was forced to drop one feature. Motorola may have to drop another. More to come.
The 1969 War of Attrition. Photo: Israeli Air Force
Many commentators took at face value HTC's declaration of "an actual victory" after the U.S. International Trade Commission ruled that it had infringed Apple's (AAPL) patent on software that allowed a user to dial a number embedded in an e-mail simply by clicking on it. That MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Dec 23, 2011 6:58 AM ET
The new deadline in a key Apple vs. HTC patent infringement case is Monday, Dec. 19
HTC Incredible S
There are six more days of nail-biting ahead for Apple (AAPL) and HTC.
A final decision on a closely watched case before the International Trade Commission that was due on Dec. 6 and then postponed to Dec. 14 has been postponed once again to Monday, Dec. 19.
This is a big one.
In the worst MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Dec 14, 2011 6:25 AM ET
Shares of HTC are down sharply in advance of a ruling on a key Apple patent suit
HTC Incredible S
HTC shipped more than 5.7 million smartphones to the U.S. last quarter, according to Canalys, beating out Samsung and Apple to become the country's leading smartphone vendor.
So there's a lot at stake for the giant Taiwanese phone maker -- and indeed for the manufacturers of all Google (GOOG) Android phones -- MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Dec 5, 2011 7:41 AM ET
The solution Steve Jobs said he "finally cracked" could be a $6 billion business by 2014
Click to enlarge. Source: www.patentlyapple.com
In a note to clients released Monday, Piper Jaffray's Gene Munster seizes on remarks attributed to Steve Jobs in the biography published overnight as "another data point" to support a thesis he's been championing since 2009.
"I'd like to create an integrated television set," Jobs told Walter Isaacson, his authorized biographer. MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Oct 24, 2011 6:22 AM ET
Nathan Myhrvold, the CEO of Intellectual Ventures, has become the face of patent litigation in the tech space. He told Fortune why his business is good.
By Daniel Roberts, reporter
FORTUNE -- The following transcript is edited from a phone conversation with Nathan Myhrvold, founder and CEO of Intellectual Ventures, often cited as the biggest firm among a group of so-called non-practicing entities or NPEs. Such companies frequently buy up patents without MORE
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