Apple requested 40$ royalties for every samsung phone sold

http://www.scribd.com/doc/102594989/Samsung-Apple-Oct-5-2010-Licensing

by bluelu • 14 years ago

34 50 14 years ago

scribd.com

oliwarner• 14 years ago

They can request whatever they like. Doesn't mean they'll get it.

michaelfeathers2• 14 years ago

The document lays claim to "Java, OS and OO" as Apple innovations?

taligent2• 14 years ago

What ? Nowhere in the article did it imply that.

It meant some of the implementations of those rely on Apple innovations i.e. patents. Which given how old Apple is, all of the patent acquisitions along the way and some pretty innovative work by NeXT it isn't inconceivable.

Doesn't mean that those patents will be enforceable.

michaelfeathers2• 14 years ago

See slide #8 and the notes for slide #8.

cyberp• 14 years ago

The iPhone popularized a lot of best-of-breed technologies. There were start-ups trying to do what the iPhone did. Apple is claiming those as Apple innovations. This is very similar to Apple popularizing the GUI invented at Xerox, and suing Microsoft.

podperson• 14 years ago

If it's similar to Apple "popularizing" the GUI "invented" at Xerox then all power to Apple. Certainly, Apple took Xerox's ideas and ran with them, but the results went far beyond what Xerox had made. Microsoft simply took Apple's ideas and made a shoddy clone. See any similarity?

We -- at best -- stand on giants' shoulders. Making the facile argument that Samsung got stuff from Apple just like Apple got stuff from Xerox is skipping over very important details.

metatronscube• 14 years ago

Sounds fair. Samsung's 'designs' are total ripoffs of the iPhone anyway.

josephlord3• 14 years ago

Sorry Off-topic for the royalty request but relevant to the link.

Is it just me that runs with Noscript and finds scribd a real nuisance?

The linked page wants to run scripts from:

www.scribd.com

fonts1.scribdassets.com

s5.scribdassets.com

s6.scribdassets.com

rc.rlcdn.com

resources.infolinks.com

tap-cdn.rubiconproject.com

www.bkrtx.com

And you have to register to do the direct download. I would have thought that they could have rationalised their own use of domains to a single domain (plus subdomains) that could be authorised if I wished. The other four domains I've never heard of which makes me just want to get out of the site. Should I just trust them because scribd says that they trust them?

gnu8• 14 years ago

Scribd is truly a nuisance. No one needs their product and the price is too high (zero dollars plus all of the information they can mine from Facebook).

quesera• 14 years ago

It's common to use a different (not sub) domain for static assets, especially when you use gigantic cookies in your web app. If the static assets aren't under access control, you usually don't need session information, etc to serve them properly. This saves time and bandwidth.

It's also common to spread assets across multiple hostsnames (typically subdomains that resolve to the same server) to parallelize loading by browsers.

So I try to give sites some leeway, but I agree about scribd. If I can't make the site work by allowing the primary domain and a CDN domain, I generally bail.

I never ever allow unknown domains like those above, especially on a site where I'm coming to view user-submitted content.

I trust the JavaScript sandbox well enough, but if I get to the point of having to wonder about the provenance of code delivered by a site I'm visiting, I'm usually too disgusted to bother continuing.

josephlord3• 14 years ago

I know I've been downvoted (a first for me on HN - I guess for being offtopic but maybe because many people feel that I'm wrong to be objecting to this) but I also got it wrong, more sites are needed once you do allow scribd.com. All the non-scribd sites above seem to be tracking or analytics.

Additionally required after www.scribd.com has been permitted (I haven't allowed any of the advertising/tracking/SEO sites to run scripts to see if they have further dependencies):

twitter.com

p.chango.com

quantserve.com

beacon.newrelic.com - (I don't object to this one.)

www.googletagservices.com

If people think I am wrong to be uncomfortable with this sort of behaviour by a site please reply and try to change my mind.

I just really don't like the idea that websites feel free to allow half the advertising companies on the internet to know what individual* people are browsing and looking at.

Maybe I'm just too Web 1.0 and old fashioned to expect sites not to send me round the internet when I land on the page.

*Scribd may not be tracking who people are but the advertisers might be.

Someone• 14 years ago

every? $30 for every _smartphone_, $40 for every _tablet_. Sounds decent for me as a starting point for negotiations, given that Microsoft is rumoredto collect $1 to $5 per Andorid phone (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-15427575), with the $5 probably for the higher end phones.

taligent2• 14 years ago

Shame you were downvoted for expressing a legitimate point.

Microsoft is charging $1 to $5 for I believe only 2 patents (FAT and Calendar event creation). And they in the eyes of the user (based on the research) aren't as 'valuable' as the UI patents.

Also Apple was proposing that royalty rate to be lowered by up to 100% in exchange for cross licensing.

bluelu• 14 years ago

"Also Apple was proposing that royalty rate to be lowered by up to 100% in exchange for cross licensing."

Where is your source?

camiller• 14 years ago

actually Apple offered a "20 percent discount if Samsung agreed to cross-license its patents to Apple" and a further level of discount if "Samsung would stop using Apple’s most proprietary features".

http://www.macobserver.com/tmo/article/new_court_docs_reveal...

josephlord3• 14 years ago

Not 100% but 20% - read the presentation.

20% off for cross license.

40% off if OS developer already has a license from Apple (i.e. Microsoft OS).

20% off if not not a touch screen ('Not using proprietary features - specific features to be discussed' - basically not like an iPhone).

20% off if using an Apple Licensed Processor - (I don't know what this would be).

So realistically if cross license is assumed the real rate would be $24 for a Galaxy S type product, $12 for a WP7 (I don't think that the calculations on slide 18 are actually correct).

As mentioned this was the opening of the negotiation. I don't know the strength of the patent portfolio but IF it really is hard to bring a touchscreen phone to competitive level without those technologies these don't seem ridiculous prices to me.

If I were Samsung and assessed the patents as strong I would probably try to negotiate for:

1) Exclusion of lower end phones completely if no relevant patents applied.

2) Contractual commitment to get reduced rates if others get them.

3) Reduced rates or higher cross license discount.

kristopolous3• 14 years ago

Apple already eats up 71% of the mobile profits. Looks like they never forgot how to act like a monopoly in all these years and they like getting up on stage and playing all their 20 year old tunes:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Computer,_Inc._v._Microso...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphical_Environment_Manager#L...

Buying their products is saying, with your actual wallet, and your actual real money in completely unequivocal terms: "Yes, I fully support these blunt litigious anti-competitive tactics. Please do this more."

It's almost like a more evil serpent version of the Windows tax: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_refund#The_.22Windows_t...

What if Apple spent all this lawyer money instead on making a superior product that would beat their competitors, you know, because it was a better product, and not just go around and be the corporate Tonya Harding?

czr80• 14 years ago

A monopoly position is not defined by share of profits.

khuey• 14 years ago

Should it be?

bickfordb2• 14 years ago

Pricing power is a signal

Hari_Seldon• 14 years ago

Not sure what you mean by "act like a monopoly". But you're right that Apple never forgot that microsoft ripped them off and dominated the industry with their sub par OS. (I know about the Xerox stuff). This is why Steve Jobs said very clearly at the iPhone launch "and boy have we patented it".

Many companies in the tech sector have effectively been using Apple as their R&D department for decades. Samsung is just the latest and most blatant.

kristopolous3• 14 years ago

you did see this http://i.imgur.com/KPGYL.jpg right? A large-screen candybar phone isn't really revolutionary. Nor is a touch-screen interface. I really don't know what you mean. Something with a web-browser? http://www.pocketpcfaq.com/wce/wceapps.htm A home-screen? http://reviews.cnet.com/smartphones/palm-treo-600-at/4505-64... An app store? http://reviews.cnet.com/4520-3504_7-5021267-1.html Face-time? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Dell_Axim_X30_624.jpg

Nothing that Apple did was really that new ... they have never been the "new"; just the people that came up with the right marketing sauce to convince people to buy it; and that's just a US thing. US lagging behind in mobile tech was an on-going joke up until about 2007 because other companies had had run-away successes in the Asian and Europe markets already. Just nothing of that scale in the US.

There were touch-screen smartphones in 1994 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:IBM_Simon_Personal_Communi... ... Oftentimes there were widely available commercial equivalencies 10, 15, even 20 years prior to the Apple "Innovation" event. And then a few years later they (Apple) pretend like they invented and own all of it.

I don't see Palm or Rim or LG or Qualcomm or IBM or Sony or Nokia or Ericsson or even Microsoft going around and suing the pants of people in the Mobile space; even though they clearly have more of the prior art right than Apple does.

With Apple, suing people out of market has been their modus operandi at least since Lisa.

And I really don't know what you mean with the Microsoft comparison; you can do a very identical analysis with early 80s computer UIs ... from visicalc to desqview to deskmate to countless utility suites that did WIMP pre-lisa, some even graphically (e.g., wordperfect, wordstar)

GHFigs• 14 years ago

Apple already eats up 71% of the mobile profits.

You're making it sound like there's this big profit tree out there that everybody's supposed to get an fair share of. Nobody "eats up" profits. They earn them.

kristopolous3• 14 years ago

My apology ... that's a partial statement. They have 33% of the market and 71% of the profit.

Apple has the most profits with all other companies, except the one they are suing, selling at a loss. Yes, at a loss. http://www.bgr.com/2012/04/30/apple-samsung-take-profit/

The basis of these types of IP arguments is that the competitor can take short-cuts and thus price the originator out of market or at best make a much more handsome profit because they didn't have to do the R&D or some other type of fair-play argument line. You certainly don't have to prove that harm is being done for patent violation, but the idea is that such a system exists to stop it. If there's a sniff test here, the highest-profit-margin-in-the-industry Apple isn't passing it.

goatforce5• 14 years ago

"What if Apple spent all this lawyer money instead on making a superior product that would beat their competitors, you know, because it was a better product [...]"

I think it's safe to assume they have enough money to develop new products and keep an army of lawyers fed and watered.

jcromartie• 14 years ago

> Apple already eats up 71% of the mobile profits.

How do you suppose they did that? With lawyers? I don't think so.

> What if Apple spent all this lawyer money instead on making a superior product that would beat their competitors

They already do. They didn't need this lawsuit to stay competitive.

slurgfest• 14 years ago

If they don't need this litigation to stay competitive, I think it is natural to ask why they did need it.

tedunangst3• 14 years ago

I'm pretty sure when I buy an Apple product I'm saying "I like this thing you have made, please give it to me."

v0cab• 14 years ago

Samsung and the other Korean phone companies used many anti-competitive tactics against foreign phone companies in South Korea. The original iPhone's introduction to South Korea was delayed, for instance. See articles I've linked in my history.

Samsung are an extremely unethical company. I try not to have anything to do with them whenever I can help it.

> What if Apple spent all this lawyer money instead on making a superior product that would beat their competitors, you know, because it was a better product, and not just go around and be the corporate Tonya Harding?

That's exactly what they did do with the iPhone. Samsung used their might to stop it from coming to South Korea and give themselves time to develop a knock-off of it.

rabidsnail• 14 years ago

I don't think I've seen more bullshit graphs in one slide deck in my life.

Ihavenoname• 14 years ago

The title is not particularly accurate. Starting bid of 30 per phone with crops licensing discounts and discount for 'non infringing' phones. Non infringing being ones that apple did not consider to be outright copy of the iPhone trade dress and then quirky features.

Apple made enormous effort to differentiate the product and give it a personality. Samsung did not just try to match the features the old ones looked like copies.

mahrain• 14 years ago

Microsoft seems to be charging anywhere between $7 and $15 per android device for their patents. ( http://www.zdnet.com/blog/microsoft/reality-check-microsoft-... ) So while Apple's fee is much higher, it seems fair to me that given the many obvious similarities a form of patent licensing would be in order.

Apple requested 40$ royalties for every samsung phone sold

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