At a time when Apple is already in a patent war with Samsung, a federal jury ruled Thursday that Apple iPhone is guilty of infringing three patents owned by non-practicing entity MobileMedia Ideas, a company that holds more than 300 technology patents and is jointly owned by Sony, Nokia and MPEG LA.
A U.S. District Court in Delaware ruled that Apple misappropriated protected technology for the handheld devices. The infringed patents are related to camera phone technology, call rejection and call handling.
MobileMedia had filed a suit in 2010 accusing Apple of infringing 14 of its patents. The initial complaint was eventually narrowed down to three and the jurors in Wilmington, Delaware, deliberated about four hours before ruling that the iPhone maker was in violation of those inventions. "One of them is the call rejection patent (US 6253075), another is one that details a way to control call status like hold, end or what have you (US 6070068). The third is one for a mobile communications device that contains a camera, display, CPU and input method that can transmit a captured image to another device (US 6427078)," The Next Web elaborated the patents.
"We're very pleased," MobileMedia chief executive officer, Larry Horn, said in a courtroom interview after the trial. "We think it's justified," Bloomberg reported. U.S. District Judge Sue L. Robinson is yet to schedule a trial to determine the damages to be paid, which Horn said could be "substantial."
Apple had attempted to throw the case out of court last month citing prior art, but Judge Sue Robinson denied the request. MobileMedia has filed similar suits against HTC and BlackBerry-maker Research In Motion.
Apple is involved in patent legal battles in the U.S. and abroad. As Wired.com said, "So far, Cupertino appears to be winning the Apple v. Samsung war, with a jury trial finding Samsung in violation of many of Apple's patents involved in the case and owing Apple over $1 billion in damages (an amount currently in flux as post trial rulings come into effect). Apple settled with HTC, another Android hardware manufacturer it had been litigating, with a confidential licensing deal.The Cupertino company also has been involved in countless such lawsuits, including one in 2010 over wireless email delivery, its Numbers software, and GPS and voice technologies. Apple and MobileMedia will likely go into licensing negotiations in the near term."
According to an Apple Insider report, MobileMedia announced in 2010 that it would license patents related to smartphones, mobile phones and other portable devices including personal computers, laptops, notebooks, personal media players, e-book readers, cameras and hand-held game consoles.
