Motorola emerged victorious today in a case against Apple. The case was the typical patent trolling case we have come to expect from Apple. Motorola had made their own tablet, the Motorola Xoom, and naturally any other company that makes a tablet must be copying Apple’s iPad – there is just no other way any other company can strike up the originality to make anything other than a remake of the iPad (according to Apple anyway).
Apple have been relentlessly hunting down Samsung for their Galaxy 10.1 tab as well as Motorola’s Xoom tablet. In recent weeks Apple has managed to ban the Galaxy 10.1 tab in Germany, get a preliminary injunction for the sale of it in the USA but lose the case against it in the UK. This latest loss for Apple, against Motorola, took place in Germany.
It has been pointed out that courts worldwide seem to be growing tired of persistent patent and legal disputes between leading technology companies. As a result its possible that today’s verdict may be a precursor for the result of RIM versus Nokia, a case that if not overturned threatens to ruin the once might Research in Motion.
Irrelevant of what happens elsewhere, today’s result is a great victory for the consumer. Apple is not able to knock any more competition out of the market through its legal power, hopefully we will see more cases end up with a similar result.
