In yet another twist in a series of patent wars with Apple Inc., Samsung Electronics Co., the world’s largest smartphone maker, has submitted an appeal of a June ruling by a U.S. agency which said the iPhone maker was not infringing upon some of the South Korean company‘s patents, industry sources said Monday.
Samsung’s appeal in the U.S Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit came as U.S. President Barack Obama last week issued a veto on a patent ruling by the International Trade Commission that bans the import of some older models of the iPhone and iPad, dealing a blow to Samsung in its ongoing patent dispute with Apple, the world‘s second-largest smartphone vendor.
On June 4 of this year, ITC ruled that Apple infringed upon one of Samsung’s standard-essential patents, putting the ban on older Apple devices such as the iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4, iPad 3G and iPad 2 3G.
Samsung is expected to claim that its commercial patents, not standard-essential patents, are being infringed upon by Apple.
Market watchers said the U.S. government‘s decision was based on the so-called Fair, Reasonable and Non-Discriminatory standard, which was introduced to prevent patent owners from abusing their power.
Meanwhile , the South Korean government also expressed concerns over the U.S. decision to overturn a de facto sales ban on certain products of Apple Inc. for violating Samsung Electronics‘ patented technologies. (Yonhap News)
