Nokia and Apple square off in court over patent rights to technology in the iPhone

Apple iPhone, on the balance of probabilities Apple is using Nokia patents

Nokia is suing Apple for patents it thinks are infringed by Apple’s iPhone, claiming  Apple is trying “to get a free ride on the back of Nokia’s innovation.”  That seems a logical claim since I was using a Nokia cell phone in the 1980s.

The iPhone was released on June 29, 2007.  Unless Apple invented cellphone technology they must be using someone’s patents. Nokia, the world’s largest cell phone manufacturer claims it’s their patents Apple used to create the iPhone.

Apple counter-sued, of course, claiming Nokia was using 13 of their patents, Nokia was trying to monopolize the market and that Nokia’s patents royalties were exorbitant. The case will be heard in a jury trial in the US.

Does Apple think anyone will believe they invented the cell phone a decade before and somehow Nokia secretly created their phones from that technology. Apple’s claims are strategy to string out the payment of royalties to Nokia on the face of it.

Nokia was in Sixth District Federal Court last week asking the judge to throw out Apple’s patent claims.

“These non-patent counterclaims are designed to divert attention away from free-riding off of Nokia’s intellectual property, a practice Apple evidently believes should only be of paramount concern when it is the alleged victim,” charged Nokia in the motion.”

Nokia urged Sleet to dismiss Apple’s claims. “Sometimes a patent dispute is just a patent dispute,” Nokia said of its fight with Apple after licensing negotiations broke down. “Through what charitably could be called an attempt at legal alchemy, Apple employs revisionist history, misleading characterizations, unsupported allegations and flawed and contradictory legal theories to turn these fruitless negotiations into a multi-count federal lawsuit,” Nokia charged. ComputerWorld

This case will drag on for years. Apple in the meantime is suing almost everyone else who makes cell-phones such as HTC who make the Google Android phone.

This is typical Apple Corp business practice to sue all comers, even when they don’t have a leg to stand on.