In August 2013 the UK based vacuum cleaner company Dyson took Samsung to court, accusing them of infringing on their patents. Dyson accused Samsung’s new “MotionSync” range of vacuum cleaners of infringing upon their patents and took Samsung to the UK High Court. Dyson claimed that the steering mechanism on Samsung’s MotionSync vacuum cleaners copied their DC37 and DC39 models. Just three months after making the legal filing Dyson withdrew the allegations as quickly as they raised them.
Samsung were furious about the allegations and accused Dyson of being a patent troll. Commenting on Dyson’s actions to the Korea Times Samsung stated that “This is no surprise. Samsung has the right to assess the damage the lawsuit has caused. Samsung is going to take a hard-line stance against patent trolls that use litigations as a marketing tool”. Samsung is now deciding to “return the favour” on Dyson by suing them for $9.43 million for damages to Samsung’s corporate image, now that really does suck for Dyson. $9.43 million may not seem like a lot, but for a company with an annual profit of about £330 million, the amount Samsung are suing for is a sizeable chunk of Dyson’s profits.
Image courtesy of Samsung
Source: Korea Times
