Jobs wasnt no saint, but these people are pretty bad: What Choi left out was that Samsung had just suffered a huge defeat, when a court in The Hague ruled that the company illegally copied intellectual property, infringing on patents related to L.C.D. flat-panel technology owned by Sharp, the Japanese electronics concern. In a blow to Samsung, the court ordered that the company halt all European imports of the products that violated the patents. Around the same time as Choi was delivering his upbeat message, the United States International Trade Commission began blocking the importation of Samsung flat-screen products that used the pilfered technology. Samsung finally settled with Sharp. It was the same old pattern: when caught red-handed, countersue, claiming Samsung actually owned the patent or another one that the plaintiff company had used. Then, as the litigation dragged on, snap up a greater share of the market and settle when Samsung imports were about to be barred. Sharp had filed its lawsuit in 2007; as the lawsuit played out, Samsung built up its flat-screen business until, by the end of 2009, it held 23.6 percent of the global market in TV sets, while Sharp had only 5.4 percent. All in all, not a bad outcome for Samsung. The same thing happened with Pioneer, a Japanese multi-national that specializes in digital entertainment products, which holds patents related to plasma televisions. Samsung once again decided to use the technology without bothering to pay for it. In 2006, Pioneer sued in federal court in the Eastern District of Texas, so Samsung countersued. The Samsung claim was thrown out before trial, but one document revealed in the course of the litigation was particularly damaging—a memo from a Samsung engineer stating explicitly that the company was violating the Pioneer patent. A jury awarded Pioneer $59 million in 2008. But with appeals and continued battles looming, the financially troubled Pioneer agreed to settle with Samsung for an undisclosed amount in 2009. By then, it was too late. In 2010, Pioneer shut down its television operations, tossing 10,000 people out of work. vanityfair/business/2014/06/apple-samsung-smartphone-patent-war
Posted on: Tue, 10 Jun 2014 08:10:08 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015