Apple knows what it's like to win injunctions against rivals. It won four of them against Samsung (two in Germany, one in the Netherlands and most recently one in Australia; all of them preliminary). Now it seems that Apple has just come out on the losing end of a patent infringement lawsuit -- at least on a preliminary basis even though the actual decision on the merits has yet to be made. I have received a copy of what appears to be a default judgment by the Mannheim Regional Court barring Apple from selling in Germany -- the single largest market in Europe -- any mobile devices infringing on two Motorola Mobility patents and determining that Apple owes Motorola Mobility damages for past infringement since April 19, 2003.I will explain further below the scope of the ruling and the tactical consideration on Apple's part that presumably led to this. We're not talking about a preliminary injunction, but this one is in effect now and it could be appealed and lifted, which is what Apple will try to achieve. As I'll explain further below, Apple appears to be playing a risky game here, but a reader contacted me with some interesting thoughts on why Apple may have elected not to defend itself in time.
Anyone who says it's "totally symbolic" is just plain wrong. Yes, just plain wrong. The underlying tactics are procedural, as I explained from the beginning, but "totally symbolic" is something else. In fact, even the narrowest interpretation of the ruling raises serious issues for Apple's German website, as I'll explain toward the end of this post.
Look at it this way: If a decision against Apple Inc. (the US-based worldwide parent company) didn't matter, Motorola wouldn't have sued that entity in the first place. Nor would anyone else sue parent companies in those lawsuits, and Apple itself names the parent company among defendants all the time.
