Apple, Samsung Talking Truce, Official Says
Longtime bitter rivals Apple (AAPL) and Samsung may be willing to call a truce in their two-year long legal hostilities over smartphones and tablets, according to a new Korea Times report citing a Korea Fair Trade Commission (FTC) official.
According to the report, which CNET also picked up, the two heavyweight combatants have begun talks to hammer out a royalties deal to bring a ceasefire to their serial, acrimonious lawsuits. The latest episode in their litigation saga is slated to begin March 31, 2014 on a slew of new patent violation allegations spanning Samsung’s wildly popular Galaxy S3 but not the newer Galaxy S4. The companies earlier agreed to propose a settlement before January 8, 2014 to U.S. federal judge Lucy Koh, who has presided over the patent cases since 2011.
“As far as I know, the companies recently resumed working-level discussions toward the signing of a potential deal,” said the Korean regulator. “They are in the process of narrowing differences over royalty payments.”
Anti-trust regulators in the U.S. and Europe also are involved in the discussions to craft a deal, the report said.
Samsung is said to be asking for a sweeping cross-licensing agreement that would gain it access to Apple’s design patents for a pre-determined fee. So far, Samsung is balking at Apple’s demand for more than $30 for every device determined to infringe on its intellectual property, the Korea Times account said.
Evidently, there may be new wiggle room for a deal, the report said, with Apple possibly willing to pare its royalty fees and softening its position on some other issues. Still, the companies are far apart on the value each places on their patent violation claims.
“This is all about money and pride,” the Korea FTC official is quoted as saying. “This is not a political issue.”
Samsung reportedly has abandoned a plan to file patent lawsuits in Europe against Apple and other competitors, according to the report.
Since 2011, Apple and Samsung have sued each other in the U.S., Australia, Germany, Japan, South Korea and The Netherlands, with neither company willing to concede enough ground to settle. Last year, Apple chief Tim Cook and Samsung boss Choi Gee-sung tried but failed to make a deal and now the Korean manufacturer is said to be interested in dispatching its mobile chief, Shin Jong-kyun, to the U.S. for another round of talks with Cook early in 2014.
In the most recent developments between the companies, Apple renewed its motion to permanently ban sales of more than 20 Samsung smartphones and tablets in the U.S., even though the Korean vendor no longer sells any of them.
That followed a $290.5 million award to Apple by a jury in U.S. District Court, Northern District of California in San Jose in the vendor’s damages retrial with Samsung over a patent infringement case originally adjudicated last summer. The award amounted to about 77 percent of the $379.8 million in damages Apple requested at trial and more than five times the $52.7 million Samsung argued was an appropriate figure.
