Samsung hits back at Apple after USPTO decision

Apple’s multi-million dollar victory over Samsung could be in doubt after the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) said part of a patent the South Korean company was deemed to have infringed was invalid.

In an ex parte re-examination decision, the office said claim 18 of US patent 8,074,172, which covers the predictive text format, should be rejected due to prior art being discovered.

The patent, alongside two others, was asserted against Samsung when it was ordered to pay Apple around $119 million in damages in May this year.

Several other claims that were not asserted against Samsung were also rejected following the office’s decision on Tuesday (August 5).

In a court filing on Thursday (August 7), at the US District Court for the Northern District of California, Samsung told district judge Lucy Koh of the USPTO’s decision, adding that it was relevant to its defence.

News of the court filing comes just a day after the pair announced they were putting an end to all litigation outside the US.

Last month, Samsung also demanded two patents it was accused of infringing be reconsidered in light of the Supreme Court ruling in the Alice v CLS Bank case.

The hotly anticipated case, settled last month, ruled that an abstract idea is not patentable simply because it is tied to a computer system.

As a result, Samsung said the patents, which covered the “slide to unlock” feature and another for the “retrieval of information” in a computer system should be declared invalid.

The USPTO’s decision is not final and Apple is still able to appeal against it.

Neither Apple nor Samsung was immediately available for comment.