Interesting that all the other technology companies say the hearing should go ahead.
I've no idea what the argument is about but, this does appear to have merit given the names backing the appeal.
It's because every modern company is at risk due to an old and outdated law. Apple included.
What's so rotten about Apple's legal practice is that they are actually fighting to set legal precedents that would harm not only Samsung, but the whole industry, including Apple. I'm pretty sure deep inside no (sane) Apple lawyer wants this ridiculous design patent damage award to stand.
If allowed to stand, it's not too difficult to speculate whom(/who??) patent trolls would go after first.
You're one of only a few people in this thread who understand a primary reason this case is being appealed to SCOTUS, and why it has so much support from other companies.
And yes, the biggest irony and hypocrisy of it all, is that other Apple lawyers (e.g. VirnetX case) have argued the same thing as Samsung, when placed in a similar situation: that patent awards should be apportioned by how much they contribute overall out of the tens of thousands of patents used in a smartphone.
But Samsung were found guilty? What new evidence would mean this wasn't the case?
There are two primary parts to their 200+ page appeal, and both have to do with a purportedly misinformed jury awarding Apple all of Samsung's profits on smartphones that infringed on design patents.
1. "Where a design patent includes unprotected non-ornamental features, should a district court be required to limit that patent to its protected ornamental scope?"
This is about how Judge Koh instructed the jury on design patents. Or rather, didn't. Remember, you can only patent ornamental designs, not functional ones.
Even after being asked to, Koh failed to tell the jury that they should ignore the non-ornamental parts of Apple's design. E.g. rounded corners, flat face, bezel, and icon grid, none of which Apple can own. By failing to do this, Samsung alleges the jury mistakenly included such items in their decision.
Of note is that the Court of Appeals overturned the jury's verdict that Apple's trade dress was infringed, by ruling that the trade dress was unprotectable because it was functional, not ornamental.
Yet they then confirmed that the design patents (upon which the trade dress was based) were infringed. Huh? If they're invalid when combined as trade dress because of functionality, how could they be infringed on their own? This is one of the points in question.
2. "Where a design patent is applied to only a component of a product, should an award of infringer's profits be limited to those profits attributable to the component?"
The big one. This is why other companies are backing Samsung (and so would Apple if they weren't directly involved, because they're going to be a victim of it too someday).
You see, design patents have a extra wicked weapon in their legal arsenal, one that was added in 1887 to help a carpet company with friends in Congress. Anyone found infringing on a design patent can be made to give up their ENTIRE PROFIT on an item that infringes. This might have made some sense back when products contained one or two such patents, but modern products can contain thousands.
For example, if Apple were to say, accidentally use a patented image deep in some app, the owner of its design patent could in theory demand EVERY SINGLE PENNY that Apple made on all the millions of Apple devices that included it... even if that image was the very tiniest portion of the entire device.
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So Samsung's (and many others', including experts who had previously testified on Apple's behalf) argument is that this particular old statute... created for much simpler times... which gives design patents the possibility of awards far outside of their actual impact, needs to be changed or removed, and courts use only normal patent award methods as originally intended before that 1887 design patent addition.
Even the Appeals Court did not disagree, but took the easy way out and claimed their hands were tied, unless Congress updates the law:
"(Law Professors) argue that an award of a defendant’s entire profits for design patent infringement makes no sense in the modern world. Those are policy arguments that should be directed to Congress. We are bound by what the statute says, irrespective of policy arguments that may be made against it." - Appeals Court
Companies and legal experts from all sides have filed supporting briefs, in the hope that perhaps the Supreme Court can bring some common sense to play, or failing that, wake up Congress or at least the Solicitor General.
