German Court Rejects Apple Injunction on Samsung Devices

A German appeals court rejected an Apple request for a preliminary injunction against Samsung’s Galaxy Tab 10.1 tablet and Galaxy Nexus smartphone, upholding a lower court’s decision in February. FOSS Patents reported that the decision involved Apple’s “overscroll bounce” patent, a patent over Apple’s method of indicating to a user that they have reached the end of a list.

Nein!

In that earlier ruling, the Munich I Regional Court denied Apple’s request for a preliminary injunction because it doubted the validity of Apple’s patent. The Munich Higher Regional Court agreed, and Apple can only hope to assert its patent in the full trial in the Regional Court.

This is only one of several patent battles between the two companies, but the same patent is involved in a case against Motorola in Germany and Samsung in The U.S. In the U.S. case, Judge Lucy Koh granted Apple an injunction against both Samsung devices (the injunction against the Galaxy Nexus was overturned on appeal), ruling that Apple’s patent was likely valid.

Such differences between courts in different countries are not uncommon and depend greatly on local laws and regulations.

Apple didn’t comment on the decision by the Munich Higher Regional Court, but Samsung did. According to PCWorld, Samsung said, “[The decision] confirms our position that the Galaxy Nexus, the Galaxy Tab 10.1N, and the Galaxy Tab 10.1N WiFi do not infringe Apple’s intellectual property.”

The company added that, “Apple has been trying to limit consumer choice and discourage innovation through their excessive and flawed legal arguments. Despite Apple’s legal attacks against our user interface, we will continue to further develop and introduce products that enhance the lives of German consumers.”

In other news, the Patent Wars roll on.