South Korean court rules Apple infringed on two Samsung patents, fines it $35k; Samsung gets hit too
We have yet another twist in the worldwide patent battle between electronics giants Apple and Samsung, as the Wall Street Journal and Reuters report a Seoul court has ruled in favor of the latter in a patent case on its home turf. While it decided that Apple had infringed on two Samsung patents, it also found that Samsung had returned the favor on Apple’s “bounceback” design patent, but not on another regarding icon design, resulting in damages also in the “tens of thousands” against Samsung, according to WSJ’s Evan Ramstad. He also reports that other than the light financial slap on the wrist, the ruling means that the infringing products can no longer be sold in South Korea, however that doesn’t mean much because most of them aren’t on shelves any more anyway. Asia Economic reports the two patents Apple was found to have infringed are of the much-disputed standards-essential type relating to the transmission of data.
Developing…
Filed under: Software
South Korean court rules Apple infringed on two Samsung patents, fines it $ 35k; Samsung gets hit too originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 23 Aug 2012 23:11:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Anyone who’s had to recharge an EV — or, for that matter, any mobile device with a very big battery — knows the pain of waiting for hours while a lithium-ion pack tops up. South Korea’s Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology has developed a conduction technique that could cut that charging time down to less than a minute. By dousing the nanoparticle materials of the battery in a graphite solution that’s then carbonized, the researchers make a web of conductors that all start charging at once; current batteries have to charge towards the center slowly, like a not-very-edible Tootsie Pop. The immediate goal is to develop a secondary battery for an EV that could provide extra mileage in a matter of seconds. Here’s hoping that the Ulsan team’s fast-charging battery is more viable than others and spreads to just about everything — we’d love to have EVs and laptops alike that power up in as much time as it takes to fill a traditional car at the pump.
[Image credit: iFixit]
Filed under: Transportation, Science
Korean carbon-coated lithium-ion battery could cut recharge times down to minutes originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 15 Aug 2012 19:31:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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It sounds like the sequel that didn’t even make it to DVD: RoboCop’s jaded, rotund, less attractive younger brother, who never made the police force — and tired of living in his sibling’s shadow — took a job as the next best thing: a prison guard. Well, that might not make the silver screen, but it’s certainly reality TV. Meet Robo-guard, the world’s first robotic correctional officer. Developed in South Korea, Robo-guard is equipped with 3D cameras that let it observe inmates, while special software looks out for changes in behavior. Should anything suspicious be detected, he’ll raise the alarm. A lone wolf, he works his beat autonomously, but can also be controlled manually via an iPad, if human colleagues want to check what’s going down. Initial field trials are under way right now, and if all goes well, he’ll earn a place in more prisons. Who knows, he may even make deputy one day.
Continue reading Robo-guard the South Korean correction service robot says ‘stay out of trouble’ (video)
Robo-guard the South Korean correction service robot says ‘stay out of trouble’ (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 15 Apr 2012 09:35:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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What happens when Korea’s biggest wireless carriers and Korea’s biggest phone manufacturers get caught offering bogus wireless phone deals to their customers? Well, according to the Yonhap News Agency, Korea’s Fair Trade Commission gets pissed off and slaps those companies with huge fine — 45.3 billion won ($ 40.2 million) — for “price fixing and consumer fraud.”
If the fines are any indication, then carrier SK Telecom and Samsung Electronics were the biggest offenders here — they netted themselves a 20.2 billion won ($ 17.9 million) and 14.2 billion won ($ 12.6 million) penalty respectively.
Here’s how it all went down. Samsung, LG, and Pantech marked up the prices of a total of 209 phone models before handing them over to the carrier partners that would actually sell them. Then, those carriers would advertise those phones and try to sweeten the deal with price incentives and discounts. The phones that got the price fixing treatment ended up looking like great deals compared to ones that weren’t since their original price tags were inflated.
Of course, the consumer actually buying the phone isn’t actually getting a good deal — they’re paying the same price (or possibly more) for something “that should not have been so expensive in the first place.” What’s really earned the FTC’s ire is that the companies involved essentially lied to their customers about how good the price was in order to build momentum around certain products and services.
Yonhap’s report doesn’t mention which phones in particular were affected by the price-fixing scheme, nor does it mention the time span over which these practices occurred. That information could soon be made public though, as the Fair Trade Commission has ordered each of the companies involved to release a report that lays out how much they’ve shelled out in incentives. In addition to the fines, the Fair Trade Commission has also taken steps to bar these companies from pulling the same stunt again.
Sad to say, but this isn’t the first time that consumer electronics titans Samsung and LG have been caught fiddling with prices. The Korean Fair Trade Commission hit them and four smaller manufacturers with a hefty 194 billion won ($ 172.7 million) fine last year for colluding to fix prices on their TFT-LCDs. Not long afterward, an antitrust lawsuit was filed against said companies here in the States, to which they eventually settled.
Remember that LG P330 13.3-incher we covered back when it was warm? The one that had everything going for it except precise release info? Well, it’s finally dragged itself out of the factory and onto the shelves of a Korean retailer. Unfortunately, the Core i7 processor has been replaced by an i5-2435M running at 2.4GHz, but that’s hardly a deal breaker — and it’s possible a higher specced variant will eventually see daylight too. The other key credentials are all in tact: an NVIDIA GeForce GT555M taking care of the visuals, a 40GB / 640GB SSD and HDD combo for snappier performance, and an IPS display built into an all-metal 1.7kg (3.6-pound) chassis. The price is listed as ₩1,364,000, which converts to a hefty $ 1,220 — but we wouldn’t be surprised if LG takes that down to below the MBP threshold when the product comes stateside.
LG’s thin and mighty P330 laptop surfaces at Korean retailer originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 07 Nov 2011 05:05:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Graphene’s greatness comes from its flexibility, both figurative — you can make everything from transparent speakers to stain resistant pants with the stuff — and literal. And now researchers in Korea have given us another pliable graphene product by creating a stretchy transistor from the carbon allotrope. The trick was accomplished by first layering sheets of graphene on copper foil and bonding it all to a rubber substrate. To complete the transistor channels were etched onto its surface, then electrodes and gate insulators made of ion gel were printed onto the device. What resulted was a transistor that could stretch up to five percent without losing any electrical efficiency, and the plan is to increase its elasticity through continued research. Keep up the good work, fellas, we can’t wait for our flexible phone future.
Korean researchers create stretchy transistors made of graphene originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 28 Oct 2011 06:10:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Wouldn’t it be nice if we lived in a world where we all just got along, people worked for the thrill of it, and knowledge was free? Yeah, fat chance dreamers. ‘Sue’, our new millennium’s most oft-used verb, is getting some heavy play at the hands of the tech industry. The latest court room combatants? Why, that’d be LG Group and Osram. You see, once upon a time LG was late to the LED patent game, and was content to fork over the cash to Osram for use of its tech. Skip to now, and the electronics giant’s claiming it can get its lighting goods elsewhere, picking from a plethora of relevant IP-holding companies and combining that with its own patents. Despite having already countersued Osram in July to prevent the import of that company’s allegedly infringing products into South Korea, LG’s gathered its legal arsenal once again to block the sale of Audis and BMWs throughout the entire country — cars that include Osram’s LED tech. It’s hard to imagine the courts would grant such a wide-sweeping ban on major auto players’ bread-and-butter. And all grandstanding aside, it’s more likely the two fisticuffing parties will come to some sort of revised financial agreement.
LG seeks ban on South Korean BMW and Audi sales, sticks out its LED lit tongue at Osram originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 29 Sep 2011 22:08:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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LG’s fleet of Optimus handsets got slightly larger yesterday, with the announcement of the Optimus Q2 — a follow-up to that LU2300 QWERTY slider we saw last year. Powered by a 1.2GHz Tegra 2 processor, this forthcoming device runs on Android 2.3, boasts a spacious, four-inch, IPS-based LCD with 700 nits of brightness and features a five-megapixel rear camera, along with a VGA front-facing shooter. The Korean manufacturer added that the Q2 will be about a tenth of an inch thinner and 0.35 ounces lighter than its 3.5-inch predecessor, and that it will ship with a wider keyboard. LG is expected to launch the handset in South Korea next week, though pricing and plans for a wider release remain a mystery. Head past the break for the full, translated PR.
Continue reading LG unveils Optimus Q2 QWERTY slider, slated for Korean launch next week
LG unveils Optimus Q2 QWERTY slider, slated for Korean launch next week originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 19 Sep 2011 03:27:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Sorry folks, this colorful Series 3 lappy from Sammy is for the fine citizens of Korea only, at least for the moment. The 350U weighs in at just under three pounds and 0.8-inches thick, while housing a Core i5, up to a 640GB HD, a 12.5-inch anti-reflective screen, and a battery large enough to keep it chugging along for over eight hours. Really, the big difference between this notebook and the same-sized Series 3 shipping here in the states are the color options. While Americans all get the same gun-metal gray, our friends across the pacific can pick black, silver or pink (you know, for the ladies). The 350U is priced starting at 1,090,000 won, just over $ 1,000. Check out the gallery below.
Gallery: Samsung Series 3 350U
Samsung Series 3 350U laptop delivers colorful ultraportable computing to the Korean masses originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 16 Sep 2011 13:41:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Kim Hyung-Suk has been busy these past few months. An attorney based out of Seoul, he gained a bit of notoriety for being the first person to receive a cash settlement from Apple for the iPhone’s location-tracking tendencies. He also announced that he and his law firm, Mirae Law, would be looking into the possibility of filing a class-action suit against Apple. According to a report from Bloomberg, with 27,000 Korean complainants on board, that suit was filed today.
Credit where credit is due, Kim Hyung-Suk certainly has a sense of humor. The website set up by his firm last July to reach out to potential plaintiffs greets visitors with an ironic spin on Apple’s language: “Finally. The real action against Apple. Now available here.“
Mr. Hyung-Suk’s original payout was 1 million won (roughly $ 930), and the firm is seeking that same reward for each of the 27,000 affected customers. This news comes hot on the heels of news that Apple was being fined 3 million ($ 2,808) won by the Korea Communications Commission for collecting location data even when users disabled all the pertinent features. If this keeps up, Apple may soon be looking at paying out some serious money in compensation.
Should Apple settle in this suit, the rough total in compensation paid out would be the Korean equivalent of over $ 25 million. Given that Kim Hyung-Suk successfully got his piece of the pie, Apple may be looking at some serious legal maneuvers to try and get the suit dismissed. In fairness, with over $ 76 billion in their domestic coffers, the settlement costs would be a proverbial drop in the bucket. Still, expect to see Apple put up a concerted defense against the suit in coming weeks.
