Apple seeks Google data in Samsung suit
The high-profile infringement litigation between Apple and Samsung Electronics took a new turn this week as Apple asked a judge to force search giant Google to turn over documentation related to its Android operating system.
The three companies are in a legal tangle due to the complicated nature of smartphone software. In the lawsuit, Apple claims that Samsung’s Galaxy S3 infringes on patents contained within Apple’s iPhone 5.
The Galaxy S3, though, runs on Google’s Android operating system. Google develops sequential versions of the open source software, and Samsung then modifies the code to suit its devices.
According to Bloomberg, Apple told U.S. Magistrate Judge Paul Grewal in San Jose that Google is withholding information about what terms it’s using to find the documents Apple has requested in pretrial information sharing.
Google declined to comment. But ostensibly, it does not want to turn over any documentation involving Android to Apple.
Google also claims to be at an unfair disadvantage, according to Bloomberg. Matthew Warren, a lawyer for Google who also represents Samsung, told the judge that Apple made a “strategic decision” in filing its case “to keep Google off the complaint.” Because of that, Warren said, Google doesn’t have the same legal obligations that Apple and Samsung have in the case, especially with respect to handing over documentation.
As competition has heated up in Silicon Valley for the top spot in the smartphone market, so have the courtroom wranglings. The rivals’ smartphones employ myriad overlapping technologies in their hardware and software, and corporate legal departments have seized on the opportunity to slow competition by bringing them to court to defend their devices.
This courtroom battle isn’t the first time the two technology giants have faced off. Last summer a jury awarded Apple $1.05 billion in damages from Samsung for infringing on six of the iPhone maker’s mobile-device patents.
U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh, correcting what she said was the jury’s error, lowered the damages total to $639.4 million and ordered a new trial in November for some of the products at issue in that case.
As competition has heated up in Silicon Valley for the top spot in the smartphone market, so have courtroom wranglings.