In a May 23 filing with US District Judge Lucy Koh in San Jose, California, Apple Inc is seeking again to obtain a sales ban on older models of Samsung Electronics Co. The new legal challenge sought by the iPhone maker was done following a May 2 verdict it received from its patent infringement lawsuit against the South Korean smartphone maker. Bloomberg said Apple had won $120 million of the $2 billion original amount of damages it was seeking in the patent infringement case, which was also presided by Koh.
The news agency, citing legal experts, have said that winning a sales ban could be difficult for Apple, considering the fact that Koh had already rejected two earlier bids in that case. In the conclusion of the second Apple-Samsung legal war over patents, the iPhone maker was deemed to have infringed one of the Galaxy phone maker's patents. Bloomberg said Samsung has yet to request a ban on Apple products/
Law professor Michael Risch at Villanova University said about Apple's latest bid, "(Apple's bid) seems like a hard sell, given that it failed to achieve an injunction in the last trial with significant design patent infringement and similar feature patent infringement."
Apple has earlier argued that a sales ban was more important that getting monetary damages. Based on the data compiled by the news agency, the two are currently sparring over the top spot of the market that was valued at $338.2 billion last year, with Apple waging legal battles against Samsung across four continents since 2011.
In a statement regarding Apple's sales bid, Samsung spokesman Adam Yates said via email, "After the jury rejected Apple's grossly exaggerated damages claim, Apple is once again leaning on the court to push other smartphones out of the market. If granted, this would stifle fair competition and limit choice for American consumers."
