Mikey CampbellAfter ruling one week ago that Apple failed to prove injury in its case against Motorola, Seventh Circuit Judge sitting by designation on the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois Richard Posner has decided to grant the company's request to a hearing that could see the sales ban of certain Motorola products, reports FOSS Patents.
The decision is not a complete reversal of Judge Posner's original rejection order, however, as the distinguished jurist qualified his statements last week Thursday by saying he would deliberate on whether to move forward with Apple's motion for injunctive relief. A follow-up final statement on the issue was scheduled to be released that same day though no such document was published.
Judge Posner's decision to grant Apple a hearing is a double-edged sword for the iPhone maker as Motorola Mobility is also allowed to argue for injunctive relief. That road may be a rocky one for the now Google-owned company because it has entangled itself with a number of FRAND-based lawsuits and will have to address those assertions as they pertain to any future proceedings in Judge Posner's court.
"…if Motorola means to argue for injunctive relief it should be prepared to address the bearing of FRAND on the injunction analysis," Judge Posner wrote in Thursday's order.
In previous statements regarding the hearing, Judge Posner was critical of arguments made by both sides, calling some "frivolous" and "vague." Apple's legal tactics were directly called into question at one point when a motion to reconsider was called "troubling."
Both parties are slated to submit their respective briefs by Monday, June 18 for an in-court hearing scheduled for June 20.
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13 Comments
I said this could happen, and that he hadn't actually made a decision yet.
The 'distinguished jurist' is sounding and acting utterly confused. Looks like it is setting up for an appeal regardless of which side wins/loses.
And the Apple-hostile forums and bloggers were having such a good time reporting how Judge Posner bitch-slapped Apple the evil patent troll into next Tuesday.... Let the wailing and gnashing of teeth commence.
[quote name="anantksundaram" url="/t/150716/apple-given-second-chance-at-motorola-injunction#post_2128061"]The 'distinguished jurist' is sounding and acting utterly confused. Looks like it is setting up for an appeal regardless of which side wins/loses.[/quote] Don't forget that this is already a Federal Appeals court. He does get overturned, but not very often.
[quote name="Suddenly Newton" url="/t/150716/apple-given-second-chance-at-motorola-injunction#post_2128072"]And the Apple-hostile forums and bloggers were having such a good time reporting how Judge Posner bitch-slapped Apple the evil patent troll into next Tuesday.... Let the wailing and gnashing of teeth commence.[/quote] The interesting thing here is that even if this was over, Apple didn't lose. If anything, it was Motorola that had the worse time of it as their attempts at an injunction over their FRAND patent, and it was I believe, reduced to one, had been denied.