The May 2nd verdict in the patent infringement trial did not secure a sweeping victory in either Apple Inc. and Samsung Electronics Co, Bloomberg reported. Foreman Thomas Dunham, who led the jury with the verdict, did not award the $2 billion in damages the iPhone maker was seeking for alleged infringement nor acknowledge all of the two claims Samsung has filed against Apple.
The trial reportedly involved 1- Samsung devices and five of Apple's, which demanded the jury to examine the complexities of both the iOS and Android mobile operating systems used in the smartphones. The news agency said the May 2 verdict will help the judge decide on the probable requests filed by both companies to ban sales of each other's products that allegedly infringed patents in the US.
Dunham, as described by Bloomberg, is a retired IBM executive and is experienced with patent litigation. Although he reportedly fell short of describing how the jury had weighed each of the evidence and witness testimonies presented at the trial, he commented that the $2.2 billion Apple was seeking was too much.
In an interview yesterday at the federal courthouse in San Jose, California, he said, "I'm not going to argue with them that it's not fair, but we came to a different conclusion. We came up with a different fair and reasonable (royalty rate)."
Intellectual property litigator David Shlansky, who has followed the case, told the news agency it was not usual for Dunham to lead the jury to produce a mixed bag result. He said in an email, "The nominal award on one patent to Samsung implies a careful reckoning with each claim, and a deliberate, compartmented treatment -- similar to a last will leaving a nominal amount to deliberately avoided beneficiaries, saying effectively, ‘I did not forget you, I just didn't think you deserved much.'"
