Apple asks ITC for stay on sales ban affecting older iOS devices

Apple has asked the United States International Trade Commission (or ITC) to stay a ban on sales of older iPhone and iPads while a court considers an appeal. The company filed a motion on Monday arguing that the ban, which is the result of a Samsung patent infringement complaint, will ‘sweep away an entire segment of Apple’s products…’

GigaOM reports:

“Less than four weeks before an import ban on popular Apple products will take effect, the iPhone maker is asking the International Trade Commission to stay the ban while a court considers an appeal.

In a motion filed Monday with the ITC, Apple said the ban, set for August 5th, will “sweep away an entire segment of Apple’s product offerings,” and also harm its phone carrier partners.”

For those who missed it, the ITC ruled last month that several Apple products, including the iPhone 4, the iPhone 3GS and 3G iPads, infringe on one of Samsung’s cellular patents. The commission issued a blanket sales ban on the devices, which would bar Apple from importing them into the country, and it’s currently trying to appeal the decision.

“If the Orders go into effect, Apple will lose not only sales of its iPhone 4 (GSM) and iPad 2 3G (GSM) products but also the opportunity to gain new smartphone and tablet customers who otherwise would have purchased these entry- level Apple devices…

…The products subject to the Commission’s orders have been purchased by [REDACTED]. They remain very popular and are strong sellers for the GSM carriers. As noted above, the GSM carriers will be placed at a competitive disadvantage against their CDMA competitors because the Orders will prevent them from offering these popular, entry-level devices.”

In a statement last month, Apple said that the ban would not impact the availability of its products in the United States. But given the above comments from Monday’s filing, it appears they’re starting to get a bit more nervous. If Apple doesn’t win the stay, the White House Administration is essentially its final hope to avoid the sales ban.

It’ll be interesting to see how this plays out.

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Texas firm suing Apple over call forwarding feature found in iPhone 4S/5

Apple’s no stranger to being on the defendant side of patent infringement lawsuits. In addition to its ongoing court battle with Samsung, there are a number of smaller companies hoping to squeeze some money out of the tech giant via patent suits. And today, we’re adding another one to the list.

Texas-based Bluebonnet Telecommunications filed a lawsuit against Apple yesterday in an [surprise] Eastern District Texas courtroom, claiming that the call forwarding feature found in the company’s iPhone 4S and 5 handsets infringes on one of its patents it has owned for over a decade…

The patent in question is U.S. Patent No. 5,485,511, which as AppleInsider notes, covers a “method and apparatus for determining the telephony features assigned to a telephone.” More specifically, it describes a telephone that talks to a central switch to display a list of telephony features.

On the surface, Bluebonnet looks like your typical patent troll. It acquired the 511 patent from Siemens Rolm Communications back in June of 1996, and in addition to this Apple lawsuit, it is using it in infringement suits against a number of high profile tech companies includingPantech and Samsung.

The firm is seeking financial damages resulting from the 511 patent infringement, as well as a permanent injunction barring Apple from further infringingment. The company is also requesting that the court add pre-judgment and post-judgment interest on the total amount of damages awarded.

You can follow the case under Civil Action No. 2:13-cv-00513, no judge has been assigned yet.

In somewhat related news, it was announced earlier today that Apple’s IP chief, Boris Teksler, has left the company to join French media company Technicolor.

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ITC judge finds Samsung guilty of infringing on Apple’s text selection patent

In a decision issued on March 26, but kept classified until earlier this week, an International Trade Commission judge found Samsung to be infringing on Apple’s US RE41,922 patent that covers things like text selection and translucent buttons.

It’s only a preliminary decision, and the judge only found Samsung guilty of infringement on one of two patents listed in the complaint. But if the decision gets upheld, Samsung could once again be looking at a major product ban in the US…

Reuters reports:

“Samsung Electronics Co Ltd infringed a key portion of an Apple Inc patent by including a text-selection feature in its smartphones and tablets, an International Trade Commission judge said in a preliminary decision…

…If it is upheld, the ITC can order any infringing device to be barred from importation into the United States. Apple has alleged that Samsung’s Galaxy, Transform and Nexus devices, among others, were among those made with the infringing technology.”

The patent in question is labeled a “method or apparatus for providing translucent images on a computer display,” and the features in Samsung’s products that seem to be infringing on it are text selection in its browser and the buttons in its Photo Gallery.

Apple filed the original complaint with the ITC in mid-2011, and initially it included 7 patents. Samsung was found guilty of infringing on four of them last October, and Judge Thomas Pender was asked to reexamine two of them, which brings us to today.

Although we’re still a ways off from a definitive outcome here—the full ITC commission isn’t expected to rule until August, and then there will almost certainly be appeals—the ramifications of it could be huge. Several Samsung products could face sales bans.

Of course, it seems like we’ve heard this story before, and nothing ever happens. In fact, look at Apple’s big $1 billion victory against Samsung last fall. That settlement has since been cut in half, and who knows when, or if, Samsung will have to pay it.

I get that you have to defend your intellectual property, but this just all seems like such a waste of time and resources.

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