Apple have just lost their appeal hearing against their rival Samsung today in the UK High court regarding as to whether the Samsung Galaxy tablet infringed upon Apple’s iPad design.
Apple were appealing against a decision from back in July, that The Samsung tablets do not infringe Apple’s registered design No. 000181607-0001. Today’s ruling means that Apple will still have to abide by Judge Colin Birss’s original orders, whereby Apple will have to advertise publicly on their own website as well as in a list of magazines that Samsung’s Galaxy tablets are not copies of the iPad. These adverts will have to be paid for by Apple and must remain for at least 6 months. Judge Kitchin also stated that the notices must be in a font size no smaller than Ariel 14. The magazines that are to show the adverts in are:
- Financial Times
- The Daily Mail
- Guardian Mobile magazine
- T3
A spokeswoman for Samsung made a statement regarding today’s appeal decision:
“We continue to believe that Apple was not the first to design a tablet with a rectangular shape and rounded corners and that the origins of Apple’s registered design features can be found in numerous examples of prior art. Should Apple continue to make excessive legal claims in other countries based on such generic designs, innovation in the industry could be harmed and consumer choice unduly limited.”
Apple have yet to make a statement regarding today’s decision.
