Apple, Samsung declare peace in the biggest modern technology patent fight

While the set of Smartphone Wars included all major mobile device manufacturers, the fight between Apple and Samsung was the most intense. Apple accused Samsung of "slavishly" copying the design of the iPhone, while a Samsung lawyer called Apple "Jihadist. The resulting litigation cost each company hundreds of millions of dollars in legal fees and tested its reputation as an innovator.

Sumo wrestlers & # 39;

"Sumo wrestlers are tired of the wrestling match," said Paul Berghoff, a patent attorney with McDonnell Boehnen Hulbert & Berghoff in Chicago, who has followed cases over the years. "They were both tired and happy to stop paying the lawyers from the outside.We never know who flashed first, who made the call."

For Apple, the Samsung case had become a distraction over "ancient history," Berghoff said. The iPhone maker is involved in a multibillion-dollar legal battle over patent royalties to pay to the designer of mobile chips Qualcomm Inc., a fight that swept the regulators, including the US Federal Trade Commission and Apple's subcontractors.

By many testimonials, the iPhone revolutionized the smartphone market when it was introduced in 2007 by Jobs, who called the device "magical" and warned: "Boy, l & # 39; Have we patented? "

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Samsung, which was already on the market, had to adapt quickly as consumers grabbed the stylish iPhone, with its ease of use and its design prices. These days, Samsung is making fun of Apple in commercials featuring people opening up new boxes of Galaxy smartphones while a croaker singer "I'm leaving you," an obvious reference to the latest. iPhone.

The technological landscape has changed considerably since the beginning of the conflict. Apple has expanded its range of iPhone to include more expensive and cheaper models. He also reorganized the phone's interface with new icons, colors and gestures. Samsung has added new models with curved screens and iris scanners that Apple has avoided.

Chinese phone manufacturers

The two companies remain far ahead of the global competition in phone sales, but Chinese phone makers such as Huawei Technologies Co. and Oppo have started eating out of Samsung's market share while Apple's has remained relatively stable.

In the first quarter of this year, Apple held 16% of the smartphone market, while Samsung accounted for 23%, according to IDC data. This compares to 30% for Samsung and 19% for Apple in 2012, the year of the original lawsuit.

The smartphone wars follow a long American patent litigation tradition whenever there are spectacular innovations in an industry, that it's about sewing machines, planes, radios, d & rsquo;, & nbsp; & nbsp; & nbsp; & nbsp; & nbsp; & nbsp; & nbsp; & nbsp; & nbsp; & nbsp; & nbsp; & nbsp; & nbsp; & nbsp; & nbsp; & nbsp; computers or diapers. Companies use their patents to slow the growth of their competitors, to boast of their rights or to force competitors to change their products.

"It always ends with a settlement because, once tired, it makes perfect sense to attach all the details and reject the dogs," Berghoff said. "You can never eliminate the other side, but you can inflict some monetary pain and get them to change their technology.Sometimes it gives the other party a better product."

New ideas

Mobile device companies have come up with new ideas, but it's unclear whether patent litigation is a motivator, said Michael Carrier, a professor at Rutgers Law School in Camden, New Jersey, a specialist. antitrust laws and intellectual property.

"What Apple / Samsung has shown is that litigation is not the perfect way to solve these fights," Carrier said. "At the end of the day, I'm not sure that Apple would have said it was worth it." It was an expensive litigation that lasted for years, and I'm not sure what it was. they removed it.

While the decisions have never been meaningful for the company's results, Apple has long argued that there was a bigger principle at stake. After the 2012 jury face Apple, head Tim Cook's management said that the lawsuit was about values, and that the company "has chosen the lawsuit reluctantly and only after repeatedly asking Samsung to stop copying" his work.

Jury Prize

Apple earned $ 539 million Jury award against Samsung in May in a new lawsuit on damages resulting from their initial showdown at Federal Court in San Jose, California, which ended with a verdict of $ 1.05 billion. Some of this money had already been paid to Apple before a Supreme Court ruling on how the damages were calculated, as was a verdict of $ 119.6 million against Samsung which was confirmed on appeal.

"This case has been sent to the institution for some time," said Michael Risch, a law professor at the Law School of Villanova University in Pennsylvania. "That seems to be the final nail, waiting for a jury verdict and little progress on appeal."

Apple said after its May win that the business "has always been more than money" and "it is important that we continue to protect the hard work and innovation of so many people at Apple. "

A spokesman for Samsung declined to comment on the settlement and Apple did not respond to a request for comment.

The iPhone maker has already entered into separate agreements with Google, which developed Android, and HTC, the maker of Taiwanese mobile devices.

In 2012, HTC agreed to make quarterly royalty payments to Apple and pledged not to make phones that looked like copies of Apple's products. In the 2014 regulation of Apple With Google, who bought Motorola Mobility, both parties agreed to drop their respective struggles and work together on political issues involving patents.

Although the smartphone market is no longer growing, Apple and Samsung will likely remain competitors for decades in new categories such as autonomous cars, augmented reality glbades, smart speakers and artificial intelligence software.

The case is Apple Inc. c. Samsung Electronics Co., 11-cv-01846, United States District Court, Northern District of California (San Jose).