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Samsung failed again July 2 in an attempt to stay a federal judges order that it stop selling the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 tablet and the Nexus smartphone until a patent-infringement suit brought against it by Apple is resolved, the San Jose Mercury News reports.
U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh, sitting in San Jose, declined Samsungs request to stay her orders from last week barring Samsung from selling the devices, which Apple claims infringe on patents it holds for its iPhone and iPad devices. The Samsung products run Googles Android operating system, a fierce rival to Apples products running its iOS system.
Samsung is disappointed with the courts decision that denied our motion to stay. We believe this ruling will ultimately reduce the availability of superior technological features to consumers in the United States, Samsung said in a prepared statement. Regardless, Samsung said it will continue its efforts to appeal the District Court ruling.
An Apple spokeswoman told the Mercury News that the Samsung products look remarkably like Apples: “This kind of blatant copying is wrong and, as we’ve said many times before, we need to protect Apple’s intellectual property when companies steal our ideas,” she said.
The trial on the merits of Apples infringement claims is scheduled to begin July 30 in San Jose.
Suspending sales of the Galaxy Tab 10.1 and the Nexus smartphone are unlikely to have a major impact on Samsung’s earnings, given that the firm has since introduced upgraded models, the Mercury News reported. But the trio of rulings against Samsung is considered significant because such injunctions are rarely granted.
Apple hasnt always gotten its way in court. A federal judge in Chicago in June denied Apple an injunction against Googles Motorola Mobility business to stop the sale of Motorola devices running Android. Google recently acquired Motorola Mobility from its parent company, Motorola, which is based in suburban Chicago.
Apples antipathy toward Samsung is simultaneously directed at Google, whose Android OS also powers smartphones and tablets from HTC, Motorola, LG and others. Smartphones running Android held the highest market share, and sales grew the fastest globally in the first quarter of 2012, according to research firm IDC. Android shipments grew by 145 percent from the first quarter of 2011, to capture a 59 percent share of the smartphone market, based on OS. Apple came in second, with a 23 percent share, based on an 88.7 percent increase in sales.
On the tablet front, Apples iPad is the market leader with a 22.5 percent share, based on unit shipments of 17.2 million, in the first quarter of 2012, according to NPD DisplaySearch. The report includes laptop computer sales as well, but NPD says 80 percent of Apples portable PC sales were of iPads13.6 million units to be exact.
Trailing the iPad was Hewlett-Packard, with an 11.6 percent share based on sales of 8.9 million units. HPs portable PCs run Microsoft Windows or webOS, which runs on its short-lived TouchPad tablets. The next three ranked selling brands run Android: Acer Group, with a 9 percent share, based on 6.9 million units; Lenovo, with a 7.7 percent share on 5.9 million units; and Dell, with a 7.3 percent share, based on 5.6 million units.
Adding to the competitive pressure in the market, and the legal pressure to fight patent disputes in court, is a July 3 report from DisplaySearch, which forecasts that tablet shipments will surpass notebook shipments by 2016.
In the Walter Isaacson book Steve Jobs, published shortly after the Apple co-founder Jobs death in October 2011, the author quotes Jobs as being furious that Google was introducing the Android operating system to run on smartphones from various handset makers.
Google, you f**king ripped off the iPhone, wholesale ripped us off, Isaacson quoted Jobs as saying. Im willing to go to thermonuclear war on this.