Items tagged with smartflash
While Apple and Samsung carry a lot of baggage relating to their legal past and current competitive environment, they are also somewhat cordial when it comes to a manufacturer-supplier relationship. Samsung provides components for Apple products ranging from displays to NAND flash chips; the company also recently secured a contract to produce the A9 processor that will go in Apple’s next generation iPhone. The strangely intertwined relationship took an even stranger turn late last week, and it involves a patent troll that we’ve talked about previously here on HotHardware. In late February, a jury in Tyler, Texas ordered Apple to pay Smartflash $532.9 million for infringing on three patents related...
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Just days after winning a patent infringement lawsuit against Apple to the tune of $532.9 million, Smartflash LLC is again suing the Cupertino outfit over the exact same patents. The Texas-based company feels confident it can squeeze more money out of Apple by again claiming infringement, this time focusing on devices that were introduced after the prior case had begun. According to Reuters, Smartflash wants Apple to pay additional damages for using its allegedly infringed patents without permission in devices like the iPhone 6, iPhone 6 Plus, and iPad Air 2, none of which were included in the original case. "Smartflash filed the complaint to address products that came out too far into the last...
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It's a good thing Apple has plenty of cash on hand because the Cupertino outfit has just been ordered to pay $532.9 million after a federal jury in Tyler, Texas found that its iTunes software infringed on three technology patents belonging to Smartflash LLC. That's hundreds of millions of dollars less than the $852 million Smartflash was seeking, though far more than the $4.5 million Apple argued it should owe at most. Apple's reaction to the verdict is one of disgust, as it pretty much insinuated that Smartflash is a patent troll, at least in this instance. "Smartflash makes no products, has no employees, creates no jobs, has no U.S. presence, and is exploiting our patent system to seek royalties...
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