Apple Gets HTC’s Android Phones Banned in the U.S.

The United States International Trade Commission (ITC) has sided with Apple in a patent suit against smartphone maker HTC by ruling that the latter has, indeed, violated Apple-patented inventions, thus banning the import of several HTC handsets in the US.

Gadgets cited in the suit included key names like the Sprint Evo 4G and the Verizon Droid Incredible, according to The Verge. The ruling practically wipes HTC off the U.S. smartphone market.

The Commission specifically found that HTC devices infringe two claims of patent #5,946,647 - a system level patent on analyzing and linking data structures issued in 1999.

According to Google Patents, the documentation filed over a decade ago describes “A system and method [that] causes a computer to detect and perform actions on structures identified in computer data.”

The patent description continues: “The system provides an analyzer server, an application program interface, a user interface and an action processor. The analyzer server receives from an application running concurrently data having recognizable structures, uses a pattern analysis unit, such as a parser or fast string search function, to detect structures in the data, and links relevant actions to the detected structures. The application program interface communicates with the application running concurrently, and transmits relevant information to the user interface.”

Inventors James R. Miller, Thomas Bonura, Bonnie Nardi, David Wright further explain: “Thus, the user interface can present and enable selection of the detected structures, and upon selection of a detected structure, present the linked candidate actions. Upon selection of an action, the action processor performs the action on the detected structure.”

Since the elements infringing on Apple’s patent are software-bound (i.e. are present in the Android operating system), the Cupertino, California-based fruity company could theoretically go after every Android-based phone out there in the same manner.

Nothing would have pleased the late Steve Jobs more, especially after Walter Isaacson spilled the beans on his plans to go “thermonuclear” on Google for using key iOS elements in their own mobile operating system.

According to the aforementioned source, HTC agreed to remove the infringing technology from its phones, but insisted that it was a “small UI experience”.

Apple thought otherwise, as evidenced by the company’s own official response to the ruling:

“We think competition is healthy but competitors should create their own original technology, not steal ours.”