The legal battle between Apple and Samsung continues. Apple is now trying to prove that Samsung has systematically copied a lot of things from the iPhone, from design to user interface. We reported earlier that Apple stated that Samsung ‘slavishly copied’ its UI icons. A newly revealed confidential document from Samsung may substantiate Apple’s claim.
The document in question is an internal Samsung document. Apple was somehow able to get hold of it and has now submitted this 132-page document as evidence in the court.
The document is a 2010 report by Samsung’s product engineering team. It is basically a detailed comparison of different user interface features of iPhone and Samsung’s Galaxy devices. After comparing the two, in each case the team provides a set of recommendations as to what Samsung must do to successfully compete with iPhone.
The recommendations clearly show that Samsung engineers believe Galaxy devices would be a lot better if they worked more like iPhone. Naturally, Apple is using this to reassert its point that Samsung has indeed copied many elements of iPhone’s user interface.
Samsung, however, is towing two arguments: first, that a number of things that Apple claims it has patented are not patent-worthy and should have been treated like open industry standards. And second, that Samsung didn’t infringe any of Apple’s official patents and that Apple’s claims are baseless.
During the course of hearing, Apple recently called in a number of experts to attest that the coincidence between iPhone and Galaxy devices is not incidental and that it is systematic, drawing the conclusion that Samsung copied them directly from iPhone.
Talking about the legal tussle between the two tech giants, a Samsung official remarked, “Samsung benchmarks many peer companies. In fact, these are typical competitive analyses routinely undertaken by many companies in many industries – including Apple. Samsung stands by its culture of continuous improvement and innovation. We are very proud of the product innovations driven by our more than 50,000 designers and engineers around the world who have made Samsung’s products the products of choice.”
You can read the entire 132-page document here.
Source: iPhone, Galaxy S 1 Review
Courtesy: All Things D
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