Apple: Samsung Copied Design
Lawsuit Claims Galaxy Smartphones and Tablet 'Slavishly' Stole From iPhone, iPad
Apple Inc. sued rival Samsung Electronics Co., claiming its Galaxy cellphones and tablet "slavishly" copied Apple's iPhone and iPad, in another sign of the escalating intellectual-property tensions in the mobile market.
Apple's lawsuit, filed Friday in the U.S. District Court of Northern California, alleges that Samsung copied the look, product design, packaging and user interface of its products, violating its patents and trademarks.
"Rather than innovate and develop its own technology and a unique Samsung style for its smart phone products and computer tablets, Samsung chose to copy Apple's technology, user interface and innovative style in these infringing products," Apple said in its 38-page suit. The lawsuit shows side-by-side comparisons of the Apple iPhone 3GS model, released in June 2009, and the Galaxy S i9000 model, released in March 2010.
Apple also showed photos and images that pointed out similarities in the two companies' packaging and icons for software applications such as music, phone, texting, and contacts.
"This kind of blatant copying is wrong," Apple spokeswoman Kristin Huguet said in a statement.
A Samsung spokesman said the company will "actively" respond to the lawsuit. "Samsung's development of core technologies and strengthening our intellectual property portfolio are keys to our continued success," the spokesman said.
The lawsuit is the latest legal swipe in the competitive smartphone and tablet markets, showing how high the stakes have become.
Apple's iPhone dominated smartphones for several years, but is being overtaken in unit sales by rivals' phones, like the Samsung devices named in the suit, that run on Google Inc.'s Android operating system.
Research firm IDC expects the smartphone market to grow more than 49% in 2011 from 303.4 million units in 2010. In tablets, Apple is expected to dominate the market through 2015 according to Gartner Inc., but is facing increasing competition from other companies.
Apple is also embroiled in legal battles with companies such as HTC Corp. , Motorola Mobility Holdings Inc., Amazon.com Inc., Nokia Corp. and Eastman Kodak Co. over products such as smartphones and software, some of whom it has sued and some of whom it has been sued by.
Apple is also in a legal dispute with Microsoft Corp., which is challenging Apple's trademark for the term "app store."
"It's another arrow in their [Apple's] quiver to slow down their closest competitor," said Edward Snyder, an analyst for Charter Equity Research in San Francisco, referring to the suit against Samsung. Mr. Snyder said he expected the two companies to eventually settle.
The lawsuit is likely to further complicate the relationship between the two consumer electronics giants. Samsung makes microchips that are used in some Apple products as well as memory chips used in the MacBook Pro computer line. But it is also becoming a strong competitor in mobile devices.
Apple accounted for 4% of Samsung's 2010 revenue of 154.6 trillion won ($142 billion), according to regulatory filings in South Korea. Using current exchange rates, that meant Apple spent about $6 billion at Samsung last year, second only to Sony Corp., which buys chips and liquid crystal displays from Samsung.
ENLARGE
Intellectual property experts said the suit is reminiscent of the legal battles between Apple, Microsoft and Xerox Corp. over the user interface and design of personal computers. "It's deja vu all over again," said Dan Burk, a professor at the University of California Irvine School of Law.
But while those battles were largely over copyright, this time the battles are over trademark and patents. Mr. Burk said the challenge for Apple in its trademark arguments will be to override defendants' possible defense that features were similar because of functional necessity. In its patent claims, there will likely be a question of the validity of the patents themselves, he said.
For Samsung, the Apple lawsuit revives a copycat charge it has often heard from other electronics firms during its rise over the last two decades. Samsung in recent years has strived to develop in-house design capabilities and has produced distinctive TVs and cellphones.
But it fell behind in smartphone competition, in part due to the closed-market nature of its home country, South Korea, which didn't permit smartphones until late 2009, and used the Android platform to quickly catch up. In the new lawsuit, Apple says that Samsung used packaging for smartphones and tablets that closely resembles Apple's, and even a sunflower logo to depict the photo library on its products, just as Apple does.
Alan Fisch, an attorney with Kaye Scholer LLP in Washington D.C., said, "By sheer volume alone, this is a substantial assertion of intellectual property rights." He added that Apple's request for a preliminary injunction on the trademark aspect of the dispute could be ruled on within months.
—Evan Ramstad in Seoul contributed to this article.
Write to Yukari Iwatani Kane at yukari.iwatani@wsj.com
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Excuse me! I'm running an apple farm for some 30 years! Well, can somebody help me to sue Apple? I think the company apparently copied the logo from my apples so far. The shapes look very much similar always! ~^^~
There are plenty of ways to design a phone, and nothing before the iPhone could have possibly been mistaken for an iPhone. You can put an LG Prada next to an iPhone and make a case for Apple copying some of their design aspects, but you would never mistake the iPhone for the Prada; and that’s what this lawsuit is about.
I created a couple visual charts, comparing the iPhone with the Galaxy S and the F700 (as an example of what Samsung's phone looked like before the iPhone had any influence on design). Apple's trademarks are then broken out line by line to see how they hold up against both of Samsung's phones. Also reviewed are the iPad vs Tab and Samsung's UMPC before the iPad, the Q1; and packaging for all 6 devices. If you're interested in what Apple is suing for, this is a pretty good visual guide to why they think Samsung's devices/packaging are infringing.
http://peanutbuttereggdirt.com/e/?p=218
Or not. Apple and Adobe go at each other tooth and tong over Flash and directly compete (Aperture vs Light Room), but Adobe makes bucks off of PS for Mac and just released new iPad Apps. Microsoft and Apple are in court half the time or more, but Office for Macs finally a good as well as profitable project, while more copies of iTunes are running on Windows than on Macs. And there's more with Exchange, etc., etc. Shifting partterns of "co-opetition" often define the rapidly morphing tech industry. But of course it makes things a bit testy..... ...and could, if not worked out, become a long-term rift. But at the level so far, impossible to jump to any such conclusion.
I've now read the complaint in the lawsuit and it is rather compelling. The most convincing aspect is the incredible difference between Samsung phones before and after the debut of the original iPhone. You can get some insight from this article:
http://bit.ly/gOT2eD
-- The REAL Julia Gomez
Yeah and every TV and LCD flatscreen has the same "look and feel."
The breadth of this case, spanning utility patents, design patents, trade dress, and trademarks, is impressive. I think to a lay person, the design patent case might be the most compelling. It's easy to forget, but before the iPhone, no phone looked like the iPhone, and Apple would surely remind a jury of that fact.
I think with the CAFC's reiteration of the "ordinary observer" test, the design patent case looks fairly strong: http://www.applepatent.com/2011/04/apple-v-samsung-design-patents-egyptian.html
- Patrick
applepatent.com
this is why corporate law is so lucrative
One thing comes to my mind.
Apple: innovative.
Samsung: copycat.
I don't know about copying a design but Samsung clearly copied the 'concept' of Apple products. However I love competition so let Samsung fight for their own survival.
As a fan, I'm kinda with Apple, but I've got a five year old feature phone that uses a sunflower icon for "My pictures," so one wonders besides what's TM'able and patentable, how much is prior art......
...as for "app store" and such, too bad PPG never embedded a transistor in a piece of glass and trademarked the word Windows...... ...and "killer apps" predate iOS by decades.
I say screw Apple. They need to face some competition.
I have seen this movie before:
"Apple Computer, Inc. v. Microsoft Corporation, 35 F.3d 1435 (9th Cir. 1994) was a copyright infringement lawsuit in which Apple Computer, Inc. (now Apple Inc.) sought to prevent Microsoft Corporation and Hewlett-Packard from using visual graphical user interface (GUI) elements that were similar to those in Apple's Lisa and Macintosh operating systems. The court ruled that, "Apple cannot get patent-like protection for the idea of a graphical user interface, or the idea of a desktop metaphor [under copyright law]..." In the midst of the Apple v. Microsoft lawsuit, Xerox also sued Apple alleging that Mac's GUI was heavily based on Xerox's."
source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Computer,_Inc._v._Microsoft_Corporation
Of course Apple copied the look and feel of Xerox PARC's machine but then we don't talk about that do we?
Samsung will continue to fall behind if they cannot come up with innovative software. Actually I would be happy to have just OK software. I have an 18 month old Samsung Impression and the PC software for it is childish and barely functional. Software cannot be an afterthought. Wake up Samsung!
Haha! This is funny, and almost embarassing for Samsung. I think apple should chill a little bit though. They're products will always be more coveted--who wants a cheap knock-off ipad?
Apple can also claim to have invented the wheel, but this won't stop blacksmiths.
Not even the hippies at Apple want competition. See what happens when socialists are challenged?
Apple--what a bunch of pathetic crybabies.
This is my first post and it is being done from an android based smart phone. My girlfriend has an iPhone the duality continues with all of our tech at home and work, and I have to say both products are awsome and we enjoy them.The flaming going back and forth on this topic is really very funny.The question that should be asked of these developers is.."If you can both come up with innovative tech and work well together as the iMac proves...why the arguing..if you value your customers THAT much why not work together to make it an even better experience for your customer?"
Setting the patent claims aside and focusing solely on the trademark claims, Apple's spokesperson says, "This kind of blatant copying is wrong." Actually, "this kind of blatant copying" is not wrong - it's called "competition." It is not generally unlawful, as Apple contends, to market and sell “cheap imitations” of high-priced products. Nor is it wrong for competitors to copy such products, even if they did not work hard to develop these items, as Apple complains. That competitive conduct is the lifeblood of our free-market economy, and it benefits consumers. See Coach Leatherware Co. v. AnnTaylor, Inc., 933 F.2d 162, 171 (2d Cir. 1991) (“Lanham Act protection does not extend to configurations of ornamental features which would significantly limit the range of competitive designs available. We are concerned that the grant of such broad relief chills competition excessively.”) (citation omitted); Streetwise Maps, Inc. v. Vandam, Inc., 159 F.3d 739, 741 (2d Cir. 1998) (“Competitors, by copying and underselling a product’s originator, enjoy a ‘free ride’ on an originator’s efforts. Yet, since the common law favors competition, unless a plaintiff can establish that the defendant encroached on its trademark or copyright, the law will tolerate such conduct.”). I was pleased to know there was a product similar to the iPad, at a lower price. I was pleased to know of a competitive offering. Apple's effort to kill competition through a misappication of trademark law is offensive.
Then there was my wifes Palm VIIx. with as much screen as a Iphone and a modem for web and E-mail built in. It would even pay MP3's. Way back in 1998. Sorry Apple just because your phone is rectangle and black (now white) doesn't mean you own the idea. And Steve your a CEO get a shirt and tie and start dressing like one.
let the lawyers work it out while we enjoy all the options available to us consumers
As someone who lost their technical edge with the demise of FORTRAN and DOS, I'll leave the technical battles to those of you better informed.
But as a consumer of these products and a business-person, Apple runs the risk here that their actions are counter-productive. In essence, they are admitting that the Galaxy Tab is comparable to an IPad. If it weren't comparable, why would you sue someone for copying you?
I've been considering getting my wife an IPad for her birthday. Based on this article, I'll go look at the Galaxy as well. Somehow, I don't think that's what Apple intended.
Let's say it is incredibly different. What does that prove? There are tons of different objects or electronic devices in the world that "looks and feels" like an iPhone. My PC desktop looks like an iPhone, rotated clockwise.
Don't mind little Miss Sunshine there ... besides the fact that she can't seem to quote facts accurately (no wonder she cannot afford the WSJ subscription price - not much demand for lawyers that cannot get the facts correct) she's not really sociable until she's had her morning coffee and eaten a puppy.
"... trademarked the word Windows..."
Because every Graphical based OS for years before had conformed to a metaphor called WIMP which is Windows, Icon, Menu, Pointing device. I.e. Window was a long established term. iOS is simply a flavour of MacOS which used windows, and the term windows, for years before MS Windows came along. No, Apple didn't invent the windows concept, but they licensed parts of it from Xerox, who probably did.
So Microsoft couldn't protect the word windows, but they do protect the name Windows, and I think you'll lfind that it you try to release a new OS (say a Linux distro) and call it WIndows, MS' lawyers will be round pretty quickly.
You have only seen the movie in your mind, and you should ask for a refund for the ticket price.
The past decisions were wrong. Apple can patent anything, because it is superior. A superior approach will always prevail. The previous rulings will eventually be reversed, as they were incorrect and do not respect the way these things are meant to be. And Apple will prevail in this current case also. You know nothing of the law, or much of anything else. Apple is always superior, which is why it cannot lose. Only small people cannot see this truth.
We don't talk about it because it did not happen. Only in the small minds of people who refuse to see Apple as the great innovator and creator of all information products that matter. Other products are irrelevant.
Kind of what I thought of Apple's cheap knock off of the original iPad, the GRiDPad. (Note that Jobs even stole the name.)
I won't line the pockets of that idea thief!
I will say that Samsung's YP2 MP3 player is the best I've ever used. My son bought one in Seoul and it comes with all sorts of hacks that make it very useful as a subway guide around the world, among other things. Samsung has pretty cool products.
Julia,
NO YOU CAN'T!
By the way, contrary to your ranting here, I have yet to see either Oblammer or Jobs walk on water.
Lie, cheat and steal? Yes to all three.
True Agio, but Jobs will claim that he's always been in front of the wagon wheel pulling it along. Of course, I would half agree with him, he is the back half of the horse.
It's more like...
Apple-what an effective group who's learning to play business hardball they way it has to be played in today's world of rapidly-moving world technology markets. Apple's the most-sued corp. in the industry - if mostly by patent trolls - and has a decent track record of not losing many (if some). So they're only applying predominant standards. And they not only purchase new intellectual property from time to time, they're very active in the patent-filing arena. And as IBM has proven since the dawn of the computer age, you can't have too broad a patent portfolio.
Are all the patents they're applying for going to stand? No. But emerging law in this arena has allowed many patents to stand that likely would not have in other industries, at least not in decades past. Companies not only need a good staff to protect them, it's in their best interest to act pre-emptively in this climate at least from time to time.
And firing shots across Android's bow makes real business sense in some cases.
We are not crying. We are stopping second-rate companies who do not deserve to be in the market. Their products are useless and do not conform to what people now want. So anything that cheats to look like the superior chosen brand must be excised.
That sounds nice, however, the iOS / Android battle is quite literally an epic showdown for tech dominance over the next 10 - 15 years. I'm not convinced it's winner-take-all (i don't expect a Windows-esque monopoly to develop; there is room for more than one mobile operating system). The competition is fierce, and the endless lawsuits are evidence as such. Interestingly, Microsoft is nowhere to be found.
The screen is 2" smaller and it uses the Android OS. Those two facts make it sufficiently dissimilar and inferior to the iPad that I do not regret my iPad purchase. Another option is to get a netbook with a 9" screen for about $250. Given that it is a real computer it can do things that iPads and so forth can't. The useful parts of the iPad for me are the fact that it has a reasonable size screen to play movies on and that Bloomberg has an app that lets you use it as a Bloomberg terminal that does not time out in an hour the way Bloomberg Anywhere does. The lack of Java on the iPad is a pain.
Until you read things from Gizmodo's review of the 2010 Galaxy Tab. Let's start with the headline:
"A Pocketable Train Wreck"
need more?
"This thing is just a mess. It's like a tablet drunkenly hooked up with a phone, and then took the fetus swimming in a Superfund cleanup site."
Good luck with the newer versions, which has a similar price to the ipad 2. Considering Apples total dominance of the app market, why in hell would someone consider a look-a-like competitor?
Buy an Apple, if you have a lot of paper on your desk that you don't want to blow away.
This is what they were afraid of..
http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/126653/20110324/new-galaxy-tab-vs-ipad-2-what-is-your-choice.htm
more for less and even better..we'll see..
I actually tend to agree with you on this ... the court got it wrong. But, after 17 years later ... how's that reversal coming?
Faking another commenter's screen name and icon and making comments she never would is a new low even for the childish 'anything but Apple' lobby.
Faking another commenter's screen name and icon and making comments she never would is a new low even for the childish 'anything but Apple' lobby.
Good one!!
You are nobody to speak of Jobs. You are not even a person compared to him, with all he has done for the world.
Your ironic humor seems to be lost on this group. But I think it's funny.
At the real Julia Gomez - it wasn't me, truly. But it is quite hilarious given your non-stop defense of the King of Copying, Steve Jobs.
So with that, I'll pad off to bed with a huge smile on my face and no guilt in my soul.
Oh, and my original post at the #1 posting was deleted by the WSJ with no objectionable content unless calling Jobs the King of Copycats got Rupert (or more likely, Walter) angry. So don't feel too bad, I was punked by some Apple fanbois punk.
Faking another commenter's screen name and icon and making comments she never would is a new low even for the childish 'anything but Apple' lobby.
Time to sue Steve Jobs for stealing the name, look and feel of the GRiDPad.
"So anything that cheats to look like the superior chosen brand must be excised." Using your convoluted and uninformed logic, this is exactly what Jeff Hawkins needs to do to shut down the sales of the iDud.
Yes, you are crying.
You might be right but I would be shocked if iOS and Android are still around in 15 years (though the companies will hopefully still be here).
Yes Utopia sounds nice dosent it? As I read this the only thing I could think of is.."Why sue Samsung?" I truely feel there is more to this than we on the outside see as we look in.
p.s. I wonder Did windows mobile see the truck as it ran them over?
Same could be said about Palm and Treo in 2006.
As for me, I like the UI of the webOS many times over iOS, so I am looking forward to the new webOS tablet. Though the Galaxy has a snappy feel to it versus the iPad 2 when I tried both out recently.
Your link is a very superficial story. Take "The Apple app store has 85,000 apps which is signficantly more than Android's market." First of all, the 85,000 figure (which seems a bit high) is for iPad SPECIFIC apps. And if is "significantly more" than the number of Android TABLET-SPECIFIC apps, all right, probably (taking the 85,000 specified) ABOUT 84,700 MORE!
And the specs aren't clear yet, but the iPad will probably have at least double the useful daily battery life of the buggy-Flash-running (sort of) Samsung unit.
Further, "According to a new survey (Feb, 2011), 16 percent of those who bought a Samsung Galaxy Tab have returned the device to the store since its launch, compared with just 2 percent of buyers of Apple's iPad." http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/11/02/01/samsung_galaxy_tab_has_16_return_rate_apples_ipad_just_2.html
Next, the quality of the user experience is not even compared. No tablet review has found any Android tablet's overall performance to equal, let alone beat, the overall experience of the iPad.
Finally, selling an 8.9" tablet for the same price as Apple's 10 incher does not make them the "same price." Less for more and not better is more like it.
(The total iOS app store has several hundred thousand, fyi.)
That does not exist and should be taken down. Stop spamming.
Raj,
Thanks for the link. Looks interesting.
But the folks at IBTimes could use some writing lessons... The comment on apps started with "The strongest strength of Apple...". I can hear high-school English teachers cringing everywhere...
Hope all is well with you.