In series of struggles over smartphone technologies, Apple Inc. has won $539 million from Samsung Electronics Co. in the final throes of the two at a U.S. court.
Seven years after the start of a global patent battle, Apple sought about $1 billion in damage, in retrial of a case that originally produced a verdict of that amount in 2012. But this time, Samsung argued that it should pay only $28 million.
The judges at the federal court in California, decided that the Samsung has has infringed three of Apple’s design patents:
The covering and the rounded corners of its phones, the rim that surrounds the front face, and the grid of icons that users view.
In 2012, a $1.05 billion jury verdict was whittled down by a previous retrial in 2013, along with some appeals and adjustments. At that time, Samsung agreed to pay some damages.
But the South Korean conglomerate company has fought over the final amount ever since.
Since the case went to the U.S. Supreme Court in 2016 before it was returned to U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh, with $399 million of damage, Samsung has to pay another $140 million.
The verdict is a "big win" for Apple as it received a bigger proportion of what it sought. This is a "huge loss" for Samsung.
"Today’s decision flies in the face of a unanimous Supreme Court ruling in favor of Samsung on the scope of design patent damages," Samsung said in a statement after the verdict. "We will consider all options to obtain an outcome that does not hinder creativity and fair competition for all companies and consumers."
According to a lawyer for Samsung, John Quinn, the company would raise its objections in court filings.
Apple said that the case, for all this time, “has always been about more than money.”
"We believe deeply in the value of design, and our teams work tirelessly to create innovative products that delight our customers," the iPhone maker said.
Indeed because in a report, Samsung is said to earn at least $38.9 million in profit each day in 2018. This is about $1.6 million per hour, and many of that came from its mobile devices based on its previous quarterly earnings. What this means, Samsung's technology division on its own, could pay Apple in just about two weeks.
The war is also beyond the traditional Android vs. iOS war, as the two are already enjoying a significant portion of the mobile market with almost no competitor close to them.
The war is all about supremacy.
Both Samsung and Apple are far ahead of the global smartphone competition. While the smartphone market is growing far slower than it was back in 2011, both are also competitors in other fields. In the future, the two would probably see each other in the market, and in the court, more often than not anymore.