Tech giants Apple and Samsung have voluntarily agreed to take back their respective appeals of a patent-infringement case that ordered an import ban on some of Samsung’s older phone models over infringement of two Apple patents – a touchscreen interface feature and a headset plug detection technology.
The Korean company, on Thursday, told the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit that “We conferred with Appellee International Trade Commission and Intervenor Apple Inc., and neither party objected to the requested voluntary dismissal.”
The next day, shortly after the Samsung’s motion was granted, Apple also requested for withdrawal of its own appeal pointing out that “The dismissal of Samsung’s appeal means the Commission’s exclusion order and cease-and-desist orders will remain in place.”
Although import ban against Samsung’s infringing products will still remain in effect, the electronics giant will no longer manufacture products that use the infringing technologies.
Further the Cupertino’s appeal will reverse the decision that allowed Samsung to create workarounds to its patented technology.
“In a commercial sense it means that Apple gets zero leverage out of its ITC case against Samsung,” remarked Florian Mueller, blogger of FOSS Patents. This means that only Samsung’s older devices including Galaxy S, Galaxy S2, Galaxy Nexus, and Galaxy Tab have been banned from being imported to the US.
Moreover, the Korean tech giant has already begun launching new products that have nothing to do with Apple’s noted infringed patents. So, basically the ban will not offer any commercial benefits to the iPhone maker.
