A recent study by a pair of law professors at Boston University School of Law sheds light on the financial impact of patent litigation, and the results may surprise you. The actual cost is even higher.
[$29 billion] figure excludes various indirect costs to the defendants businesses such as diversion of resources, delays in new products, and loss of market share, James Bessen and Michael J. Meurer state in their study.
It a rotten situation, and NPEs aren the only culprit. Apple recently convinced a judge to ban sales of Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 tablets in the US based on the accusation that Samsung copied look and feel of its iPad and iPhone devices. Moreover, the ever present threat of patent infringing lawsuits has companies spending time and resources building up patent portfolios for the sole purpose of erecting legal shields, money that could otherwise be spent on innovation.
Some companies are even looking to change the way they do business altogether. The most recent example is Qualcomm, which just announced a corporate restructuring to protect its patents. Qualcomm created a whollyowned subsidiary, known as Qualcomm Technologies Inc. (QTI), which will handle product development for the company chip business, while the existing parent company will hold onto most of the patents. Why?
According to Foss Patents, Qualcomm understands that patents are the crown jewels of the company and things can get sticky as it heads into open source territory, but it also shows how far companies are willing to go to shield themselves from patent lawsuits.
Necessity is supposed to be the mother of invention, but as long as companies like Apple are able to broadly patent wedgeshaped notebook designs and sue competing products right off of store shelves, the real need is for patent reform.
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I partially agree with you guys Although I would argue some software innovations should be patentable.
Also, to your point. The stock trader who copied code from his employer and reused it. He won the (Defence) case for both patent infringement and theft. Not that it would work in every situation, but when it comes to courts, judges do place limits and invalidate some unreasonable patent demands especially certain types of software code. Some, but not enough.
Suits by NPE is lamentable, however this is a lead in to main your point that Apple is suing Samsung for blatent copying of its products. Would it be better to let these products sell to consumers, who would be disapointed by the software and lack of a working ecosystem?
Samsung is indulging in a common Korean practice (read: Replica Rolex starting at $69!). The problem is Samsung copied the hardware, icons and AND PACKAGING. Apple says this is abuse of their products, and is ripping off the consumer. The replica Rolex will at least tell time.
There is definitely patent abuse here.
You do realize that the core of the iPhone is manufactured by Samsung, right? So it stands to reason that the hardware is going to be very similar. Why should Samsung be required to retool just so they can sell their own phone? That bogus. They make the hardware to begin with. Allowing Apple to sue Samsung for that reason makes as much sense as allowing Apple to sue, say, ASUS for selling laptops which can be deemed similar in hardware to Apple MacBooks (ASUS often manufactures for Apple, FYI, and all laptops in the industry share a very similar range of hardware, including Apple precious MacBooks). Where do you draw the line? Can Apple sue anybody who sells a product with hardware to their own products? Well, I guess it time for Apple to sue anybody who dares sell any type of computer. Apple arrogance here is simply deplorable.
says this is abuse of their products, and is ripping off the consumer.
Funny how it Samsung who purportedly off the consumer when it Apple who is doing everything in their power to prevent consumers from having the choice to buy it. Apple ripping us off, not Samsung.
Suing over the packaging doesn make any sense, either. Samsung isn slapping an Apple logo on their case, so who cares if it looks similar? If selling your product in a similar box to a competitor is grounds for litigation, why isn literally everybody in every industry suing everybody else over the same issue? jerks are selling their product in a square cardboard box which is fitted to the size of the product contained within! We do, too! This is damaging our image! Nonsense. This whole case is ridiculous. Apple is deliberately stifling competition here, and all it does is hurt us, the consumers, like you and me (and yes, even if you will never purchase a Galaxy SIII, you still being hurt because of the reduction in competition, which encourages innovation and lowers price across the entire industry). The coexistence of the SIII and the iPhone would be more symbiotic than it would ever be parasitic, so color me perplexed to see you cheering Apple on. I will never understand brand loyalty. It just makes no damned sense. You have a great deal to learn about patent law, as do most people commenting on this article. First of all the and feel of a product means everything when it concerns a design patent. Which I am assuming is the grounds upon which Apple brought this law suit. This is not a utility patent like the you were probably thinking of in your comment above. It is not what the invention does or how it does it, but the and feel of the invention. Another point to bring up is that the American Invents Act which was passed and will take hold in the coming year is going to significantly lower the amount patent litigation as a whole. Thirdly, Apple has a bunch of patents, utility and design, for the products you have listed above. Apple has a ton of patents on glass in particular, including different processes, curved glass, the glass staircase in the New York store, the connections to hold the giant glass pieces has been extremely innovative and should be rewarded for there innovation. In this case they have with intellectual property rights. They have every right to defend their intellectual property, not doing so not only hurts our economy, but all economies that rely heavily on intellectual property. Additionally, this litigation may have a slight initial cost on the economy, but remember that apple is one of the driving forces of our economy and put billions upon billions into it every year.
I posted this in related places previously, but I think it applies here: Imagine what cars, televisions, and telephones would look like if they had been invented under today patent systems. can use a wheel sir, as we created that. Your car can steer with levers. Now let talk about your use of the pedal
We never would have had a standard 4:3 ratio TV, and forget about the 3 arrangement of buttons on a touchtone phone. Every brand of gadget would have to be just different enough to slide by the patent trolls. Confusion would reign.
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