This week Apple brought action in the Federal court to prevent rival Samsung from selling it's Galaxy Tablet 10.1 in Australia. A temporary injunction was granted on the grounds that Apple claims that Samsung has infringed it's patents on the Apple IPad.
Patents open a complex can of worms - as anyone in the pharmaceutical industry will attest. They are designed as a protection for intellectual property, but they can equally be misused to built a protective wall and shield against legitimate competition.
The IPad and Galaxt 10.1 are certainly similar products, but the depth of that similarity is something that will need scientists to determine - and in all probability they may disagree and fail to come to a united conclusion. What is at stake is a huge amount of money when one product is denied market share for even a short period of time - and that in an industry when innovation makes most new products innrelevant in a matter of months.
In this case, the battle is joined between two giant, cashed-up companies who can afford an army of top line barristers and technical experts to argue their cases. Had one of the litigants been a hapless inventor of modest means - the battle would have been lost before it even entered the court doors. In this modern day and age, litigation is the preserve of the rich !
This case has all the makings of a classic battle. It is something that could ebb and flow for years, because even when the court delivers a finding the way is open to appeal, and the winner can be expected to pursue a further claim for compensation.
While this is going on, one company has a clear field to market it's product. At issue is the fine line dividing where further improvement take intellectual property into a new dimension.
Pity the poor judge trying to figure that out !
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