Apple victorious over Conversant in smartphone interface dispute
The English High Court has sided with Apple after ruling that a Conversant Wireless patent covering early smartphone capabilities is invalid as obvious.
In his judgment, issued today, November 29, justice Colin Birss said that Apple's iPhone X would infringe the Conversant patent if it was valid, but that the foundational claims of the 2003 patent were already known in 1994.
Conversant accused Apple’s iPhone X, specifically the Widgets and so-called ‘Home Screen Quick Action Windows’ (HSQAWs) features, of infringing its UK patent (2,375,712).
The patent, entitled ‘Computing device with improved user interface for applications’, was originally issued to Symbian, a joint venture including Nokia and Ericsson.
Conversant acquired the patent, which claimed priority from a 2000 filing, as part of a wider portfolio.
Claim 1 of the patent covered a smartphone display screen with a hierarchical menu screen and “summary windows for each of several different applications”.
Conversant argued that the Widgets and HSQAW features on the iPhone X infringed this claim.
Apple argued that the patent was invalid as obvious, citing two examples of prior art. These were an extract from the “Windows 98 for Dummies” book, explaining the Microsoft Outlook application of the time; as well as the 1994 manual for an IBM device called Simon.
In today’s ruling, Justice Birss ruled that the Conversant patent was invalid in light of the IBM device.
Although it did not enjoy any commercial success and relied on technology that was “almost ancient even by 2000 standards,” Birss said the device was a clear attempt at the features described in the Conversant patent.
The court also rejected the obviousness argument based on the “Windows 98 for Dummies” extract, finding that it contained too much detail to be compressed down into a smartphone screen.
The patent initially covered a “computer device”, but Conversant applied to amend it to read “smart phone”.
Birss said that the patent had originally provided a solution to a “problem on mobile telephones, because of their small screens” but that the patent had been written with potentially much broader applications in mind.
He added: “However today it does not suit the patentee to maintain such a wide claim...So the patentee has used the rather vague term ‘smart phone’, aiming as it does to catch the well known Apple smartphone product, the iPhone.”
In July, the English High Court invalidated another Conversant patent as part of a standard-essential patent dispute with Chinese tech companies Huawei and ZTE.
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