Samsung ordered to pay $539 million to Apple for patent infringement

Victoria Woollaston May 25, 2018

Following a patent battle that has raged for seven years, a judge has ordered Samsung to pay Apple $539 million (£403 million) in damages.

Samsung ordered to pay $539 million to Apple for patent infringement

Apple had been seeking $1 billion ($748.2 million) in the retrial of a case – an amount it was awarded as part of the ongoing saga in 2012 – over a number of patent infringements. Samsung argued it should only pay $28 million ($21 million). This week’s verdict places the award someone in the middle of the two.

Previous court hearings already determined Samsung had infringed on five Apple patents – two concerning utilities, and three design patents. The latter includes the rounded corners of iPhones, the grid of icons seen on a homescreen, and the rim around the front face.

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The latest damages were decided by jurors at a court in San Jose, California. They were tasked with establishing if Samsung should pay damages based on the components that infringed Apple’s patents, or on smartphone sales. However, this decision is unlikely to be the end of the saga. In a statement, Samsung said: “Today’s decision flies in the face of a unanimous Supreme Court ruling in favour of Samsung on the scope of design patent damages.

“We will consider all options to obtain an outcome that does not hinder creativity and fair competition for all companies and consumers.”

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Apple countered that it had “ignited the smartphone revolution with iPhone and it is a fact that Samsung blatantly copied our design. It is important that we continue to protect the hard work and innovation of so many people at Apple.”

The case has been ongoing since 2011, when Apple originally sought $2.5 billion over patent infringements. Today’s victory for Apple is the third-largest to be awarded by a jury in the US in 2018 and will go some way to recouping the $502.6 million (£375.9 million) in damages that Apple was ordered to pay out to VirnetX in a case earlier this year.

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