Apple hit with second iTunes infringement claim

Apple is facing a second round of legal action from licensing company Smartflash—in a lawsuit filed just one day after the technology business was forced to pay it more than $500 million in damages.

Smartflash filed the latest claim for patent infringement on February 25 at the US District Court for the Eastern Division of Texas, Tyler Division, the same court in which the previous dispute between the pair was heard.

Last week (February 24) Smartflash won $532.9 million in damages after convincing a jury that Apple had engaged in “wilful infringement” of three patents through the iTunes software.

The new complaint covers the same patents but concerns use of the iTunes software in just the iPhone 6, which was released in both the UK and US in September last year, and the iPad mini 3, which was also released in 2014.

In the former case, filed in 2013, Apple had challenged the validity of Smartflash’s patents but the challenge was dismissed by district Judge Rodney Gilstrap when he ruled in favour of Smartflash last week.

“In committing these acts of infringement, Apple acted despite an objectively highly likelihood that its actions would constitute infringement of at least one valid patent, and Apple actually knew or should have known that its actions constituted an unjustifiably high risk of infringement,” his ruling said.

Neither Apple nor Smartflash responded to a request for comment.