Court’s Apple injunction normal procedure
ON MONDAY, a court in Fuzhou, East China’s Fujian province, imposed a preliminary injunction ordering four subsidiaries of Apple Inc in China to immediately cease importing, selling or preselling certain kinds of iPhones because they violated two Qualcomm patents. Lin Wei, a lawyer, commented on Beijing News:
The ban does not mean the court has made its final ruling about the case yet. The ban is a provisional one while the case is being heard.
Some overseas media outlets reported that Apple “appealed” against the ban, which is inaccurate because according to the law neither party has the right to “appeal” against a provisional ban. Although they have one chance of requiring the court to “reconsider”.
Qualcomm has provided a guarantee of 300 million yuan ($43.6 million) for the provisional ban. According to the law, if Apple wins the case, it will be able to ask Qualcomm to compensate it for its losses caused by the ban.
Some other media outlets have hyped up the case by linking it with the trade frictions between China and the United
States, which is totally wrong because it is nothing but a commercial dispute between Apple and Qualcomm. The two companies have been at odds for more than two years, and they are engaged in legal battles in the US, Germany, as well as China.
The ban will have only a limited effect upon Apple, too, because the patents involved are for software that enables consumers to adjust and reform the size and appearance of photographs, and to manage applications using a touch screen when viewing, navigating and dismissing applications on their phones. They apply to Apple’s iOS11 operating system or earlier versions. That’s partly why Apple said the provisional ban will have little effect upon its sales.
The case is still going on.