by mando2003us
President Obama vetoes Samsung ban on Apple, Inc. iPhones, iPads
[Via AppleInsider]
Acting on behalf of the Obama administration, U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman announced it would veto the ban on older iPhone and iPad models ordered by International Trade Commission.
[More]
The ITC was really an outlier here, allowing Samsung to leverage Fair, Reasonable and Nondiscriminatory (FRAND) licensing in a predatory way against Apple.
In order for modern technology to succeed, many patent holders put their technology into a pool, permitting anyone to license the technology with FRAND rates.
Samsung had done this for other licensees but was trying to muscle Apple into paying substantially higher unreasonable rates than any other company in the world. It was essentially a form of extortion – pay the ridiculous rates or see us in court.
Samsung went to the ITC saying Apple was violating its patents. It was. It just wanted fair licensing. Other courts had recognized this and told Samsung to license the patents to Apple fairly.
The ITC, for some strange reason, did not do this. It permitted Samsung to use these standard essentials patents (SEP) in a predatory fashion against Apple and no one else, even though Samsung had put these patents in a pool.
If this had been allowed to stand, then the whole idea of SEPs would have been damaged. At any time any of the patent holders in a pool could have used their specific patents to go after another company.
There would be no standard pools at all.
A Man With A Ph.D. 