14 DAY TRIAL // Following Motorola’s preemptive launch of a declaration judgment action against Apple earlier this month, the Mac maker has fired back, launching patent infringement lawsuits against the cell phone maker.
As the licensing negotiations between the two failed to produce an agreement, PatentlyApple reports, Apple filed two patent infringement lawsuits against Motorola Inc. and Motorola Mobility Inc. in the Wisconsin Western District Court.
Covering as many as six patents owned by the Cupertino, California based electronics company, the combined lawsuits speak nothing of the accusations brought forth to Apple by Motorola Mobility Inc.'s filings.
Instead, the main focus of Apple’s lawsuits relates to what PatentlyApple describes as the most important technology of all pertaining to the next generation of smartphones: Multi-Touch.
The source, which exclusively deals with Apple’s patent application filings, points out to a statement by Apple's Chief Operating Officer, Tim Cook, who warned the competition during a financial conference, saying: "we like competition as long as they don't rip off our IP. And if they do, we will go after anyone who does."
The report continues with a briefing on the recently emerged court documents, which reveal that Apple mentions “mobile devices, such as smartphones, and associated software, including operating systems, user interfaces, and other application software designed for use on, and loaded onto, such devices,” as Accused Products.
The filings continue to outline that “Upon information and belief, these products are manufactured, marketed and/or sold by Motorola in the United States. At least the following mobile devices infringe one or more claims of one or more of the Asserted Patents: Droid, Droid 2, Droid X, Cliq, Cliq XT, BackFlip, Devour A555, Devour i1, and Charm.1,” read the filings by Apple’s lawyers.
Finally, an overview of all the patents listed in the two lawsuits is offered. The six “granted” patents listed in Apple's two distinct lawsuits are:
(Case 1) One: Apple, Inc patent titled: Ellipse Fitting for Multi-Touch Surfaces Two: Apple, Inc patent titled: Multipoint Touchscreen Three: Taligent, Inc patent titled: Object-Oriented System Locator System (Case 2) Four: Apple, Inc, patent titled: Touch Screen Device, Method, and Graphical User Interface for Determining Commands by Applying Heuristics Five: Apple Computer, Inc. patent titled: Method and Apparatus for Displaying and Accessing Control and Status Information in a Computer System Six: Apple Computer, Inc. patent titled: Support for Custom User-Interaction Elements in a Graphical, Event-Driven Computer System