ITC pushes final decision on Samsung claim against Apple back to February 6th

The ITC in the U.S. has delayed the final ruling on Samsung's complaint against Apple until February 6th from the original January 14th date. Judge James Gildea's preliminary decision found Apple not guilty of infringing on four Samsung patents. The judge said that one of the patents was invalid while at least two of the remaining three patents were standards-essential and eligible for FRAND licensing. Apple said in court that Samsung never mentioned any patent infringement until the Korean based tech giant was warned about its possible infringement of Apple patents. As a result, Apple argued that Samsung's claim against it was merely being used as a bargaining chip. While the judge agreed with Apple's assessment of Samsung's patent claims against it, he rejected Apple's defense that it would have been willing to license the patents had they been proven to be valid.

ITC headquarters in the U.S.

Samsung is being accused of anti-competitive behavior by the FTC in the states and the EC in Europe by using FRAND patents to seek sales bans against Apple and Microsoft in what appears as revenge for being accused of infringing on non-FRAND patents belonging to those two tech titans. Google and its Motorola subsidiary have been accused of doing the exact same thing leading to investigations of both companies by U.S. and European agencies. 

Samsung suddenly dropped all of its FRAND related sales injunction claims in Europe, seeking to avoid a high fine by the EC that could have been in the billions. This change led Apple to file a "Notice of New Facts," which details Samsung's decision to drop its request for an injunction in Europe, to avoid sanctions. Apple's filing might have led the ITC to delay winding up the case until it can take a deeper look at Samsung's actions. When the final ruling is made, it can be appealed to the U.S. Federal Court.

With third party tech companies filing briefs to the ITC about how FRAND licensing should be handles, perhaps some new standards will result including a set royalty on FRAND patents. Samsung and Motorola have sought licensing fees in the 2% range while Apple and Microsoft have said that this is too high.