South Korea-based Samsung Electronics Co Ltd (005930.KS) found its way to US court in April
2011 when Apple claimed that Samsung has violated Apple legal patents with Galaxy
smartphone and tablet, which uses Android system. Samsung counter sued, and the two
companies have become entangled in more than 20 cases in 10 countries (Brandon and Jason
2012).
In 2013, a series of patent lawsuits were launched against Google and its Android partners by
technology corporations including Microsoft, Apple, BlackBerry, Sony, and Ericsson. These
companies came together under the name Rockstar to attack the one of the largest search engine
in the world in what is described as a "nuclear attack" in the patent wars smartphone. At first,
Google has spent 900 million dollar for patents before the bidding war begin but Rockstar has
pushed the price up to 4.5 billion. To deal with the defeat, Google quickly purchased Motorola
for 12.5 billion dollar. The suits had been filed target Google as well as Android brands such as
Samsung, HTC, and LG
… The patents allegedly being infringed upon cover a wide range of
technology, from technical protocols involving 4G communication to a patent for an
“associative search engine” that “provides advertisements to a user searching for desired
information within a data network”.
20
GRAPH 7. Smartphone patent wars (Adapted from The Economist 2010)
Fortunately, Rockstar has put those patents on sale. This is a sure sign to prove that the patent
war is coming to an end. Rockstar is selling more than 4000 patents to a joint-stock company
called RPX,
which will license all these patents to others companies. The remaining patents,
which sum up about 2000 were distributed to others companies, particularly to Apple. Which
was reported to have snapped up 1000 patents in 2012. “Peace is breaking out,” RPX’s CEO
John Amster told the Wall Street Journal. “I think people have started to realize that licensing,
not litigation, is the best way to make use of patents, and this deal is a significant
acknowledgment of that reality” (Anthony 2014).
It seems to be that the war between major players has ended. Back in 2012, Google was very
concerned about the patents situation with Android. That’s the main reason it bought Motorola
Mobility with $12 billion dollars. But eventually, all these major players have able to sit down
and resolve most cases and agree to license each other patents.
