ITC Rules Apple Does Not Infringe S3 Graphics Patents

First time accepted submitter boley1 writes "According to Cnet — S3 Graphics's case collapsed in their ITC suit, with the ITC ruling that Apple does not infringe on any of S3's patents. A big blow to HTC according to the report." So much for HTC buying a warchest; according to the ruling it looks like AMD/ATI actually owned the patents in question.

Re:ho snap htc bought the wrong warchest

[Anonymous Coward]

Um

A) Apple sued HTC, HTC bought patents defensively
B) HTC has been making smart phones longer than Apple
C) It is widely regarded that Apple copied LG in its design of the iphone http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LG_Prada_(KE850)
D) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CW0DUg63lqU (Steve Jobs on XEROX "Great Artists Steal")

Like ITC will find in favor of a Taiwanese company

[Anonymous Coward]

When did that happen for the last time in known history? ITC has one purpose only -- to protect US companies from competition.

Re:ho snap htc bought the wrong warchest

[king neckbeard]

HTC did innovate, and they were innovating in smartphones long before Apple did. The problem was that they didn't have as powerful a patent portfolio. Really, the problem probably isn't with HTC itself. Rather, the difference is that they've largely gone from WinMo to Android. Switching from Apple's BFF to Google means that all that cross-licensing stuff between Apple and MS no longer applies to them.

ITC rejection is usual, but damage is done

[ciaran_o_riordan]

The US-ITC rejects almost all such requests, so this is no surprise and doesn't necessarily mean the case has collapsed.

Some patent holders surely use these procedures just to smear product developers and scare investors - in the hope of a easy cash settlement.

More about the ITC:
http://en.swpat.org/wiki/United_States_International_Trade_Commission [swpat.org]

Re:Like ITC will find in favor of a Taiwanese comp

[chrb]

The principle is the same though. If the U.S. International Trade Court consistently rules in favor of U.S. companies, then it is highly likely that the trade courts of other nations will rule for their domestic companies. Apple sue Samsung in U.S. and win, Samsung sue Apple in Korea and win. Apple sue HTC in U.S. and win, HTC sue Apple in Taiwan and win. It is probably no coincidence that the first company to stand up to Microsoft's Android tax has been a U.S. company, rather than the foreign device manufacturers.

As regards this particular case, this is just one ruling in response to an appeal of a previous ruling, and this ruling will in turn be appealed. And even if Apple win the appeal, it still leaves HTC with hundreds of patents from the rest of their patent portfolio, plus the 265 S3 patents they acquired, plus the new patents they got from Google [pcmag.com]. They only need to win once to be able to block sales of infringing hardware. And they can't not win some of the time - if the U.S. ITC find in favor of Apple over a foreign company hundreds of times, then the international patent system is going to tear itself apart, starting with Taiwan and Korea.

(Meanwhile, China has practically no intellectual property or patent enforcement, and is rewarded with the fastest growing economy in the world, despite a prolonged global recession. Ahh.....)

Re:ho snap htc bought the wrong warchest

[RyuuzakiTetsuya]

By innovate you mean, "making the same crappy Windows Mobile phones everyone else was making at the time?"

Or by innovate you mean, "putting a godawful skin on top of android?"