14 DAY TRIAL // Last week, Nokia won an injunction against the HTC One mini smartphone in the UK, which should have been removed from sales starting with December 6, but it seems that the court decided to postpone the sales barring for a few more days.
According to a recent article on Focus Taiwan, HTC has appealed the sales ban for the handset. The court has scheduled a hearing on December 12, and decided to allow the company to continue selling the smartphone until that date.
"HTC is pleased that an urgent hearing with the Court of Appeal has been scheduled for Dec. 12. Until the Court of Appeal hearing on Dec. 12, the court's injunction against HTC is stayed," the Taiwanese mobile phone maker reportedly said.
"Until the hearing on Dec. 12, our U.K. customers will be able to sell all HTC devices which are already in their inventories."
On December 3, Judge Richard Arnold in London ruled that HTC’s One mini smartphone infringed on patents held by Nokia, and that HTC should no longer sell the device in the UK starting with December 6.
Furthermore, the judge found that HTC One, the latest flagship smartphone from the Taiwanese version, was packing a chip that also infringes Nokia patents, but it decided to allow HTC to continue selling it.
A ban on the sales of both smartphones in the UK would have damaged the mobile phone maker considerably, the ruling suggested.
HTC has already commented on the decision, saying that it has started working with its partners to find new chipsets to be included inside its smartphones, so as to be allowed to sell them in the UK.
Apparently, the handset vendor managed to sell over 700,000 smartphones in the country between January and September this year. Apparently, Nokia’s patent lawsuit is seen as having only a small impact on HTC’s sales for the fourth quarter of the year.