Thursday brought us some interesting legal developments from America. It’s interesting simply because it didn’t involve Apple at all. Thursday’s new lawsuit filing comes from NVIDIA, the United States-base chip maker, against Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. and Qualcomm. Now, we covered this lawsuit earlier when it was filed, but we have an update to give. First, if you didn’t read the first happenings of the filings, here is a quick recap before going to the new developments.
The case from NIVIDIA is based on claims of patent infringement on various technologies that NVIDIA has. The general topics of the patents are a dedicated GPU on a device’s logic board, a GPU that includes ‘multi-headed processing’, unified shading, and programmable shading. Sound specific and technological? It is, so go digging around the U.S. Patent Office site if you really need to know what each of the patents include and cover. The case is the next part to cover.
The case, if it becomes a real case in court(s), will have Samsung pay some licensing fees for the patented technologies used. That is one of, if not the most, reasonable resolutions to a court case we’ve seen in a while, and it’s pleasant to see that being possible. So, the issue is actually this: did Samsung actually infringe on the patents that NVIDIA does in fact hold? That’s the court’s job to find out. The affected devices, though, are these (and the list varies in age and recency): Galaxy Note, Note Pro, S III, S IV, S 5, Tab S, Tab Pro, Tab 2, Note III, Infuse 4G and Illusion. NVIDIA is looking for a ban on the devices listed based on the patent infringement, if Samsung does not pay the licensing fees that is.
The new developments are now! Yes, that was a long ‘quick recap’, but we finally come to the new addition, likely the reason you’re here. Samsung, being the company it is and having dealt with the U.S. justice system for years thanks to Cupertino-based Apple Inc., is taking this case in stride. The South Korean giant is taking on the case, according to Reuters, using “all measures necessary”. This will sadly become one of the longest- or shortest-lived court disputes, and will be obnoxious for those of us that may just wish Samsung would own up and license the patents, even though their recent losses in the realm of smartphone market share have dropped profits, to allow all companies involved to move forward and continue improvement instead of being bogged down with devices as old as the Infuse 4G and Illusion. What do you think Samsung should do with the case? What ‘necessary measures’ should it take against NVIDIA? Let us know.