March was a banner month for intellectual property cases at the International Trade Commission, with 10 new matters filed.
With fiscal year 2012 half over, the ITC appears roughly on track to match last year's record 70 IP disputes brought under Section 337 of the Tariff Act of 1930.
The latest patent suits cover a grab bag of products, from semiconductors to kitchen sink garbage disposals to invisible braces.
Sony Corp. and Samsung Electronics Co. were named most often in complaints — both were hit with five new ITC suits in the first six months of the fiscal year (not counting complaints that were filed and then withdrawn). HTC Corp.and LG Electronics were both named as respondents four times. Apple Inc., which last year had the dubious honor of being involved in more ITC cases than any other company, is named in three suits.
One wide-reaching complaint was filed by Graphics Properties Holdings Inc. (formerly known as Silicon Graphics Inc.) over patents related to consumer electronics and display technology. The company, represented by Pepper Hamilton, is suing electronics makers including Apple, HTC, LG, Samsung, Sony and Research in Motion.
Eastman Kodak continued its multi-front patent fight with Apple, filing another ITC suit against the company, and naming HTC as well, alleging infringement of digital imaging patents. Kodak is represented by Brinks, Hofer, Gilson and Lione partner Jay Reiziss, according to the ITC filing.
Align Technology, which makes clear, removable Invisalign braces (favored by teen heartthrob Justin Bieber, among others), filed two suits against ClearCorrect Operating, LLC. Represented by Paul Hastings partner Scott Flicker, Align asserts that ClearCorrect infringes seven Align patents, comprised of 280 claims, related to methods for planning and implementing orthodontic treatment.
Its hard to tell with this case because all the Apple cases (that I know of) that have won agansit Samsung are design infringements. In those cases, its obvious that Samsung copied because no other phone on the market other than the iPhone has a center home button that functions in the same way. It was really dumb of Samsung to try and copy such an obvious feature.In the other hand, we really have no idea the details of how HTC is going to fight this on-going case for their appeal and I'm sure T-Mobile and Google will contribute in the fight as the feature that Apple is targeting will effect ALL Android powered devices, not just HTC. Unlike Samsung's case, their company is the only one affected because of design which is the company's internal decision.
Posted by: Arnold | June 04, 2012 at 01:05 PM