Exactly one month ago, Apple sued HTC over alleged patent infringements, and now HTC is doing the same thing to Apple. It seems the two companies just can’t get along, and their legal battle with one another will continue. Today, HTC filed a complaint in the U.S. District Court in Delaware accusing Apple of patent infringement.
When Apple first filed its complaint against HTC last month, Apple claimed HTC had infringed on two of their patents with its Android devices. The first of the two relates to receiving information that can then be used by a single interaction from the user, like getting a phone number, highlighting it, and tapping the screen to call. The second patent concerns processing real-time data on the device.
The patents Apple referred to were not just for HTC devices but related to Android devices as a whole. So, if Apple won the case, it would apply to every manufacturer that uses Android, both smartphones and tablets, and would ban them from being sold in the US. Of course, with Android out of the picture, Apple would reign supreme in the smartphone and tablet arena.
However, HTC is countering the lawsuit with its own, claiming that Apple has infringed on three of HTC’s patents–two of which were acquired when HTC purchased ADC Technologies in April for $75 million. The lawsuit aims to stop Apple from importing and selling the infringing products in the US. However, that punishment has never actually been enforced because settlements are usually made before anything drastic happens.
The complaint states that HTC acquired the patents that it in 2008 and 2010. According to Reuters, HTC is also seeking compensatory damages from Apple in addition to three times the normal damages for “willful infringement.”
HTC is just one of the Android partners to be sued by Apple. Other companies like Samsung Electronics and Motorola Mobility, which was just bought by Google yesterday, are also dealing with their own lawsuits and complaints with the U.S. International Trade Commission.
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