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11 December 2018Patents

Chinese court issues iPhone injunctions in Qualcomm case

A court in China has issued injunctions against Apple after finding older iPhone models violate two Qualcomm patents.

The ruling was announced by American microchip manufacturer Qualcomm yesterday, December 10.

The decision was issued by the Fuzhou Intermediate People’s Court on November 30, but announced publicly yesterday, according to reports.

According to CNBC, the two patents relate to the ability to “adjust and reformat photographs, and navigate through applications with a touchscreen”. The injunction applies only to older iPhone models, including the 6 and the X, according to Qualcomm.

In the statement issued yesterday, Qualcomm announced that the court had granted its requests for two preliminary injunctions against Apple, preventing the unlicensed import and sale of the infringing iPhone models.

Dan Rosenberg, executive vice president and general counsel at Qualcomm, said that “Apple continues to benefit from our intellectual property while refusing to compensate us. These court orders are further confirmation of the strength of Qualcomm’s vast patent portfolio”.

It remains unclear to what extent the injunctions will impact the availability of iPhones in China. In a statement sent to WIPR, Apple said: “Qualcomm's effort to ban our products is another desperate move by a company whose illegal practices are under investigation by regulators around the world. All iPhone models remain available for our customers in China."

Apple has since filed an appeal with the court, asking it to reconsider the decision. The company denies infringing the patents and has said the reported ban goes beyond the scope of the injunction.

Apple spokesperson Josh Rosenstock said that Qualcomm had asserted three patents that it had never raised before, one of which had been invalidated, The New York Times report.

The ruling comes as the latest development in an ongoing legal dispute between the two companies, which are engaged in patent litigation in courts around the world.

In September, Qualcomm accused Apple of stealing its trade secrets and providing commercially sensitive information to rival microchip maker Intel. That claim was made in a case filed with the Superior Court of California, County of San Diego.

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More on this story

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20 December 2018   Apple is continuing to infringe Qualcomm’s patents despite recent injunctions issued by the Fuzhou Intermediate People’s Court in China, according to the semiconductor company.
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21 December 2018   Qualcomm has been granted an injunction against Apple that bans the sale of some iPhone models in Germany.
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9 January 2019   Qualcomm has hit back at comments made by Apple CEO Tim Cook in a patent licensing spat between the two companies.