Affiliate Disclosure
If you buy through our links, we may get a commission. Read our ethics policy.

HTC drops ITC lawsuit against Apple

Last updated

HTC has decided to drop an appeal filed with the International Trade Commission that had sought to reopen a patent complaint against Apple.

The ITC dismissed HTC's complaint against Apple back in February, but HTC still had an option to appeal the ruling. MacNN now reports that HTC will not pursue the appeal and has instead filed for a motion to dismiss it.

According to the report, HTC will still have cases lodged against Apple with the ITC by way of S3 Graphics, which it acquired last year. S3 Graphics filed a suit against Apple last September. Months later, an earlier complaint from S3 was dismissed by the ITC, causing HTC to conduct a "holistic re-evaluation" of its acquisition.

For its part, Apple succeeded in winning an injunction against HTC late last year over a "data detectors" patent for recognizing actionable information such as email addresses and phone numbers. Though HTC quickly built a workaround into its handsets, HTC's handsets have still seen some delays at U.S. customs checkpoints as agents check the devices for infringement.

Earlier this month, Apple filed its third ITC complaint against HTC. The iPhone maker argued that 29 of HTC's devices continued to infringe upon its data detector patent.



3 Comments

ajbdtc826 14 Years · 190 comments

It begins: The tech trade-off conspiracy.

maestro64 19 Years · 5029 comments

that work around sucks, but I suspect most HTC customers could care less, they get the phone free and they probably do not care about these kinds of features.

defrancisco 12 Years · 15 comments

The S3 Graphics acquisition has been rumored to be motivated by it's ability to abate ITC complaints, specifically Apple, I suspect that the move is driven by the focus of another suit that would contervene. A ruling needs to made in this UI and input methodology which will put all this bickering to bed, there's infrigment and then there's outright duplication of innovation the distingtion needs to be clarified.