In the first ruling from the District Court in the Apple-Samsung smartphone patent infringement case, following the remitting of the case to the District Court by the Federal Circuit to reassess the damages previously awarded to Apple, Samsung have moved a step closer to their desire for a full retrial to reassess the damages.

Apple had contended that Samsung had waived their right to a reassessment of what should be considered as the “article of manufacture” when assessing the damages and so should not be granted permission for a retrial. Previously the damages were calculated using the whole smartphone as the article of manufacture, leading to particularly high damages of $548m being awarded to Apple by the Court of Appeals. However it was this method of assessing the damages that the Supreme Court had found to be incorrect.

The District Court have now ruled that Samsung had not in fact waived their right to arguing what should be considered to be the article of manufacture, paving the way for a retrial. This should allow Samsung to argue that the article of manufacture is a component of the smartphones, e.g. one that is more closely linked to the technology claimed by the patents at issue, in an attempt to reduce the level of damages that they owe to Apple.

“Samsung did not forfeit its ability to argue it should only pay damages based on the value of specific patents Apple accuses it of copying, instead of the value the entire smartphone, if the court finds Samsung infringed.”

http://www.thestar.com.my/tech/tech-news/2017/08/01/samsung-claims-another-win-in-apple-patent-fight/