After Saturday's verdict by a US court that found Samsung guilty of violating Apple's iPhone patents,Apple has initiated proceedings that could see the South Korean firm almost disappear from the US smartphone market.
Apple has filed a notice with the court to ban a total of eight smartphones across three communications providers.The devices are the Galaxy S 4G,Galaxy S2 AT&T model,Galaxy S2 Skyrocket,Galaxy S2 T-Mobile model,Galaxy S2 Epic 4G,Galaxy S Showcase,Droid Charge and Galaxy Prevail.
Further reading
Analysis:The Apple-Samsung verdict in quotes Apple wins patent infringement case against Samsung Apple claims a quarter of Samsung's 19.4bn euros US sales result from infringements
Apple still needs to prove to the court that its business will be massively damaged by not banning the handsets in order to have the request upheld.
Meanwhile,HTC chairwoman Cher Wang has said she remains absolutely resolute in her refusal to settle with Apple over the two firms'own patent lawsuit.
"Samsung's defeat does not mean that Google Inc.'s Android camp is defeated,"Wang told news website Cnyes.
"Every company has good innovations,"added Wang.Last year,the US International Trade Commission banned HTC phones on the grounds of infringing on Apple's patent on system detected data structures–intelligently recognising phone numbers and email addresses–but HTC soon sidestepped the embargo with a software workaround.
Perhaps Wang is hinting that the company has more responses of this nature up its sleeve.
Finally,more evidence has emerged that Apple has not spent all its time and energy on legal wranglings recently.Photos published on Chinese blog Apple.pro appear to show leaked images of an iPhone 5 with what looks suspiciously like an NFC radio(pictured).
While it will be absolutely no surprise that the device,which is rumoured to be launching alongside iOS 6.0–a mobile OS update that will introduce Apple's Passbook e-wallet system–will contain such technology,this could be the first compelling evidence.
With Everything Everywhere now granted permission to roll out 4G on 11 September 2012–the alleged day before the iPhone 5 release–the company could be looking at a minor coup if NFC is indeed at the forefront of Apple's functionality decisions.
