ITC Ruling - Rejects Apple's views and claims on FRAND

[KnightWRX]

Seems this tidbit was missed by the various Apple related blogs :

http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20121007194355579

ITC Judge E. James Gildea ruled on the 14th of September, basically rejecting Apple's claims that Samsung's terms were unfair, that Samsung can't seek injunctions for relief of FRAND patent infringement, that patent exhaustion protects Apple in regards to Samsung FRAND patents.

That's a pretty big blow to Apple's various defenses against the FRAND counter claims in Samsung's and Motorola's lawsuits since those were basically all their arguments (terms aren't fair, Qualcomm's/Broadcom's license covers us, they can't ask for injunctions over FRAND patents anyhow).

All they have left now is trying to invalidate the patents or show how their implementations are non-infringing. That or pay up negotiated FRAND terms with the different players holding these patents, like they ended up doing with Nokia 2 years back.

 

[kdarling]

None of this should be a surprise. Some of us have stated the same things over and over again:

1) FRAND patent holders only give up sole licensing. They don't give up other patent rights, such as the right to ask for injunctions. This applies not just at the ITC, either. German courts and EU officials have said that an injunction is a quite legitimate weapon if a potential licensee refuses to negotiate terms with the FRAND patent holder. (A UK High Court noted, though, that forced negotiation should be preferred over an injunction.)

2) The starting license rate that Samsung asked, is not at all unusual in the ETSI world. As the ITC judge commented, Apple did not even try to negotiate, nor did they ask for available ETSI help in doing so. Instead Apple chose to go the more expensive and lengthy route of using litigation in place of negotiation.