Apple is “extending” its legal battle with Samsung (and Google) by asking a judge to force Google to turn over documents related to its Android operating system.
As part of its second patent-infringement lawsuit against Samsung, the Cupertino-based company argues that Android is used in all of Samsung’s allegedly infringing products and “provides much of the accused functionality.”
According to Apple’s lawyer Mark Lyon, this is a question of transparency, and they [Apple] have concerns that Samsung (and Google) are not doing a full search.
Matthew Warren, a lawyer for Google who also represents Samsung, says that as a third-party to the case, Google doesn’t have the same legal rights that Apple and Samsung have, in particular with respect to “reciprocal discovery.”
The second patent suit follows a previous case in which a jury awarded Apple $1.05 billion, finding Samsung infringed six of Apple’s mobile-device patents. U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh later lowered the damages total to $639.4 million and ordered a new trial in November for some of the products at issue in that case.
[Via: BusinessWeek]