- Apple lawyer Harold McElhinny paints Apple as underdog during opening salvo against Samsung
- Samsung says every company uses the same basic shape of a phone
- Jury reduced to nine members as juror is excused for work commitments
By Eddie Wrenn
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Apple launched an attack on Samsung in court yesterday as lawyers for the firm related how Apple's entire business was at stake when it launched the iPhone.
Harold McElhinny, representing Apple, painted an evocative picture of Apple as a struggling underdog company which knew it would either revolutionise the smartphone market - or die trying.
He reminded the San Jose courtroom, in which Apple and Samsung are flinging patents at each other in a bid to prove they did not infringe each others' inventions, that the mobile market was an entirely different landscape when Steve Jobs pitched the final designs.
He said: 'Apple had absolutely no name in the field, no credibility. [The iPhone] was an entry that - had it gone bad - could have ended the company's future.
'On January 9, 2007 when Steve Jobs and Phil Schiller went through that presentation, they were literally betting their company.'
Apple attorney Harold McElhinny questions Apple designer Christopher Stringer in this court sketch during the San Jose trial
Apple and Samsung are business partners turned bitter rivals over Apple's claims that the Samsung Galaxy range infringes on the iPhone's design.
Samsung meanwhile points to pre-2007 phones to show the 'rectangle touchscreen' was not a novel look, accusing Apple of 'fighting over rectangles'.
On Tuesday afternoon, Apple designer Christopher Stringer wrapped up the first day of testimony discussing his role in helping create the company's iPhone and iPod during his 17 years at the company.
Dressed in a tan suit, the bearded and long haired designer said because of Apple's desire to create original products, he and his co-workers surmounted numerous engineering problems such as working with the products' glass faces in producing both products over a number of years.
Stringer said he was upset when he saw Samsung's Galaxy products enter the market and said: 'We've been ripped off, it's plain to see. It's offensive.'
Samsung attorney Charles Verhoeven demonstrates how rectangular phones with rounded corners' were not novel before 2007
McElhinny told the jury that Samsung faced two options to compete in the booming cellphone market after the iPhone: Innovate or copy.
In his opening statement, he claimed Samsung chose to copy, making its smartphones and computer tablets illegal knockoffs of Apple's popular products - and that Samsung 'has copied the entire design and user experience' of the iPhone and iPad.
Samsung attorney Charles Verhoeven countered that the South Korean company employs thousands of designers and spends billions of dollars on research and development to create new products.
He said: 'Samsung is not some copyist, some Johnny-come-lately doing knockoffs.'
Verhoeven asserted that Apple, like many other companies, uses similar technology and designs to satisfy consumer demands for phones and other devices that play music and movies and take photographs.
For example, he said several other companies and inventors have filed patent applications for the rounded, rectangular shape associated with Apple products.
'Everyone is out there with that basic form factor. There is nothing wrong with looking at what your competitors do and being inspired by them.'
The iPhone 4S and the Samsung Galaxy S II: Apple claims Samsung ripped off their phone with the Galaxy range
The trial resumes on Friday with the testimony of Apple senior vice president for marketing Philip Schiller.
Apple is demanding $2.5 billion in damages, an award that would dwarf the largest patent-related verdict to date.
The case marks the latest skirmish between the two companies over product designs. A similar trial began last week, and the two companies have been fighting in other courts in the United Kingdom and Germany.
Samsung counter-claims that Apple copied its iPhone from Sony. In addition, Samsung alleges Apple is using some of Samsung's own inventions without payment, such as a computer chip at the heart of the iPhone.
Samsung lawyers also stressed the company has been developing mobile phones since 1991, long before Apple jumped into the market in 2007.
Also at issue at the trial are some of the most basic functions of today's smartphones and computer tablets, including scrolling with one finger and zooming with a finger tap.
Tuesday morning's proceedings began with a bit of drama.
First, a juror pleaded with the judge to be released from the trial, saying she suffered a panic attack and spent a sleepless night after belatedly discovering that her employer would not pay her salary while she served. A sympathetic judge granted her request and left the jury with nine members.
Then the judge rebuked John Quinn, one of Samsung's attorneys, for refusing to stop a line of legal argument the judge said she had ruled on numerous times.
Quinn relented and sat down, but his tenacity underscored the high stakes of the trial that is costing both sides millions of dollars in legal fees and expenses. Battalions of lawyers from prestigious law firms are working overtime to file myriad court documents.
The most senior lawyers on each side charge upward of $500 an hour for their representation
Legal experts said that most patent disputes are resolved way before trials that can bring unpredictable and ruinous verdicts.
'A patent case of this magnitude has the possibility of impacting phone technology for years to come,' said Manotti Jenkins, a patent attorney with no stake in the trial. 'Given the substantial revenue that is generated by smartphone technology, companies are likely to prompt more litigation of this type and continue to use the courts as an attempt to protect and expand market share.'
At least the the battery is user replaceable in all the galaxy series, nothing like built in obsolescence.
- chris, sussex, uk, 01/8/2012 16:59
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