Negri Electronics Blog

Few days ago, Apple filed a lawsuit against Motorola over “Slide to Unlock” implementation. In the recent ruling on Thursday, presiding Judge Dr. Peter Guntz publicly announced a decision in favor of Apple that “most of Motorola Mobility’s products were found to infringe on Apple’s slide-to-unlock image patent”. This results in a permanent injunction against any of the offending devices.

According to Dr. Peter Guntz, the screen unlocking feature used by Motorola in its smartphones duplicates the image on Apple’s slide-to-unlock patent image.

Apple got the copyrights through European copyrights (EP1964022) in October 2010 which is titled “Unlocking a Device by Performing Gestures on an Unlock Image.” US patent and Trademark office also granted the same copyrights to Apple a year later.

Actually court evaluated three different personifications. The good new for Apple is that they won two out of three that Motorola‘s smart phones implement. The third one in which they were not succeeded is the Xoom tablet uses.

The implementation of Xoom tablet is more similar to Samsung Galaxy Note. In this user has to make a swiping gesture from the inside of a circle to the outside. It requires a relatively large screen to work somewhat well, but even then it’s not very intuitive.

In spite of Apple’s triumph against Motorola results in a complete rework of how Motorola devices handle screen unlocking. The judge shows leniency towards Motorola by not banned the device sale but force a firmware modification. According to Florian Mueller of FOSS Patents, the outcome creates a “noticeable degradation of the user experience of Motorola’s products,” as the company will probably end up extending the “slide-to-unlock circle” found in the Xoom across its entire product line.

This decision is going to be not only a blow to Motorola’s mobility division but also hurt Android handset makers in general. It will allow Apple to bring similar claims to companies using the Google operating system to court in Germany, for example Samsung in Mannheim.

This is really a huge upset for Motorola’s mobility. Although Motorola has very small share in German market but MMI is in process of being acquired by Google. Today’s ruling is significant bad news for Android at large, and Google.

Over the last few months, it seems that Apple is really chasing its competitors when it comes to legal matters. The company filed a lawsuit against Samsung over auto correct as reported previously and this time it’s Motorola who will be in the court against Apple. Apple files the lawsuit against Motorola over their use of Qualcomm technology emerges.

The suit, filed in a San Diego federal court, argues that Motorola’s German lawsuit against Apple breaches terms of a patent licensing agreement between Motorola and Qualcomm. Apple and Motorola are engaged in global patent litigation, part of a broader legal fight over the smartphone market with billions of dollars at stake.

Motorola representative Christa Smith declined to comment on the specific details of the case, but said the company “will continue to vigorously protect our intellectual property.”

It seems a bit ridiculous but Apple is basically suing Motorola over their claims that Apple is illegally using Qualcomm’s baseband chip. In the lawsuit, Apple is asking to ban Motorola from being able to sue Apple over the use of the chip.

Recently Apple files a new lawsuit against its longtime competitor Samsung. The newest complain of Apple against Samsung is the spelling and auto-correct feature, used in iPhones and iPads, that results in a proposed word hovering over letters that a user is typing. The wording on the petition is:

“One aspect of the invention involves a method that includes: in a first area of the touch screen, displaying a current character string being input by a user with the keyboard; in a second area of the touch screen, displaying the current character string or a portion thereof and a suggested replacement for the current character string …”

The second patent is not clear but it looks that it is about the ability to unlock the device from its touchscreen.

Here, are the US laws according to which Apple has filed the lawsuit against Samsung.

1. U.S. Patent No. 8,074,172 – “Method, System, and Graphical User Interface for Providing Word Recommendations”
2. U.S. Patent No. 5,946,647 – “System and Method for Performing an Action on a Structure in Computer-Generated Data”
3. U.S. Patent No. 8,046,721 – “Unlocking a Device by Performing Gestures on an Unlock Image”
4. U.S. Patent No. 8,086,604 – “Universal Interface for Retrieval of Information in a Computer System”

Let’s see what could be the result of this petition. Stay tuned with Negri Electronics to get the update about smartphone industry.

Last year in July, Apple discontinued its white plastic MacBook but now Apple has replaced it with MacBook Air. The 13-inch MacBook Air costs same $999 as the previous MacBook. It is exclusively designed for educational institutes and will be sold at to them at the same price as the 11-inch MacBook sold to customers.

For that price you will get the hardware from the entry-level 11-inch model (which also costs $999), that is a 1.6GHz Intel Core i5 processor, 2GB of RAM and 64GB of internal memory (SSD). You will, however, get the same 13.3-inch, 1,440 x 900 resolution displays from the standard 13-inch model. Apple will be offering the model in a five-pack bundle for $4,995. A 10-pack bundle and a 20-pack bundle that come complete with an AirPort Extreme and a nifty laptop cart with a built-in charging station are also available for $11,399 and $21,599 respectively.

It looks that Apple wants to change the trend by pushing iPads into classrooms as well as the traditional laptops. With the lower specs and the increased portability, the MacBook Air seems to have its tradeoffs.

A school can purchase a 30-pack bundle of 64GB of iPad 2 units along with a PowerSync cart. This may be a bit more appealing as it serves similar functions with the option of displaying digital textbooks created in the recently released iBooks Author software as well. We’ll have to wait and see if the changes cause an increase in Apple product adoption in the education industry over time.

There is a new capability added by Apple for iPad’s user to split the keyboard into two halves iOS 5, helping those without Shaq-hands type effectively in landscape mode.

Apple even went one step further in making extended text entry on the iPad 2 bearable with iOS 5; they added six hidden buttons on the split keyboard. These six letters (Y,H,B,T,G,V) are the hidden keys. These keys are invisible means these keys are not labeled. But the keys respond to touches where they should be before the keyboard is split.

This phantom buttons makes it easy for you to press Y key with your left hand or T key with your right hand.

To enable this keyboard, tap-hold on the “toggle keyboard” button in the lower right to get a menu, or tap-hold on it and drag upwards. Reverse that to reunite the two halves back to normal at the bottom.

The hidden keys are an example of the subtle design elements Apple rarely highlights, but use to round out the iOS user experience. Or this was an unintentionally cool accident that Apple decided to keep in iOS 5.

IDC, a research firm recently completed their research about the sales of mobile devices globally. The sales include full year and fourth quarter of 2011. According to IDC, Apple sales has increased dramatically and they are in the 3^rd position by moving past LG. This is the first time ever Apple moved into 3^rd position. In 2010, many times Apple came close to LG but could not able to get the 3^rd spot and even stay behind ZTE. The launch iPhone 4S and its rapid sales has change the position significantly. The sales of last quarter of year 2011 make it easy for Apple to get large enough margins to surpass LG in full-year numbers as well.

Apple has been estimated to slowly close in on one of its main competitors, Samsung for the crown of the top smartphone manufacturer, while Nokia and Samsung both firmly hold down the top two spots in the overall mobile phone rankings (with their lower-end featured phones). IDC Research had the following to say:

Apple has achieved this position globally from fifth spot; this is all because of the record-breaking shipments in the last quarter. That represents the Cupertino-based company’s highest-ever ranking on IDC’s Top 5 global mobile phone leader board. Apple’s iPhone 4S launched has made all the difference. The smartphone is available in over 90 countries that moved Apple in to 3^rd spot above LG and ZTE. U.S. and Japan were particularly strong given extra sales days in the quarter and carrier distribution.

The Cupertino California company’s share of the market hit 8.7% in the fourth quarter and registered at 6.0% for the full year. Jobs famously noted during the introduction of the iPhone in 2007 that Apple was shooting to take 1% of the massive overall mobile phone market. The company has not only met that goal but exceeded it by far. It can even go about setting its sights on a 10% quarterly share during the next surge in sales.

All in all, one year ago, Apple ranked fifth in both fourth quarter and full-year sales for the year of 2010. In the span of a year, the company has doubled its sales year-over-year and Apple was able to overtake both ZTE and LG to move into third place.

The late Steve Jobs, the Chief Operating Officer (CEO) of Apple, has a great run in last decade. During his life, Steve Jobs often faced very cold criticisms in the press, business and technology for not being more outwardly philanthropic. Steve Jobs never show off his charitable gestures to others just like his colleagues or contemporaries had shown.

As a result, Jobs was labeled by some as a billionaire who turned his back on philanthropy.

For the celebrations of the Apple’s record quarter, Tim Cook held a meeting last week. During the meeting, Cook speaks about Apple’s generosity to their employees about discounts in Apple products for their employees. This was the first time when Apple’s generosity towards employees was declared officially. According to a report Thursday in The Verge, Cook’s town hall meeting last week brought forward numerous details that have previously never been exposed.

Cook also revealed Apple’s charitable contributions on which he has spent a good amount of time. According to Cook,

“Apple has donated a total of $50 million to Stanford’s hospitals, split into $25 million for a new main building and $25 million for a new children’s hospital. Cook also spent quite a bit of time talking about Apple’s status as the leading contributor to Product RED, and expressed prides that Apple’s given over $50 million to the effort since it started.”

Clearly, Cook has different approach towards charity as compared to Jobs. Jobs once said, “giving money is a waste of time”. It is no known if it’s a rumor or reality. But one thing is very clear that Tim Cook is taking Apple in a different philanthropic course.

A German court has upheld the appeal of Apple Inc. to ban the sales of Samsung Galaxy 10.1N and Galaxy Nexus mobile phone in Germany. Today, the case has been rejected by the Munich Regional Court in which Apple invoked a patent granted last year protecting technology related to touch screens for tablets and smartphones.

The court has given the remarks that “the tablet had been altered enough to skirt Germany’s unfair competition law.”

“Samsung has shown that it is more likely than not that the patent will be revoked because of a technology that was already on the market before the intellectual property had been filed for protection,” Presiding Judge Andreas Mueller said when delivering the ruling.

Apple lost the design-right claims from Samsung that could have contributed to a broader, more material ruling covering most of the European Union. The ruling affect both Galaxy Tab 10.1 and smaller Galaxy Tab 8.9 but it doesn’t apply for Galaxy Tab 10.1N, which is the modified version of the Tablet by Samsung to bypass the German ban. Samsung began selling the Galaxy Tab 10.1N, a revised version, in Germany to get around the ban.

A lower Dusseldorf court is scheduled to rule next week on a separate case Apple filed over the Galaxy 10.1N. Samsung lost two patent rulings against its rival in a Mannheim court last month.

Yesterday, European Commission has announced that they will investigate whether Samsung broke a 1998 commitment to license any standard essential patents for phones on “fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory terms.” or not. EU said that the purpose behind this is the litigation filed by Samsung last year in European courts.

There is no doubt that Apple’s iPhone 4S is a hot product all over the world. Just like other countries China is also a big market for iPhone 4S. In a Beijing’s Apple Store a storm of crowd was outside the store in an exceptional extent. Local authorities were called to control the out-of-control masses.

All this happened made this difficult for continue the sales at Beijing stores. Later, Apple was forced to suspend iPhone sales in Beijing and Shanghai to help keep the peace and prevent further gathering of violent crowds. The company announced it would offer the device through its online store other authorized resellers until the passion settled.

Given how pervasive iPhone fever has proven to be in China, on Monday investment bank Morgan Stanley revealed its belief that Apple will soon team with both China Telecom and China Mobile to make its iPhone available on all three Chinese carriers. If that happens, analysts say, Apple could sell upwards of 40 million iPhones in 2013 alone. By comparison, Apple sold 68.5 million iPhones globally in all of fiscal 2011.

According to Analyst Katy Huberty, another factor that will help drive sales is the likelihood that Apple’s sixth-generation iPhone is probably going to be compatible with China Mobile’s looming 4G TD-LTE network, although she admits that it’s “still too early to know for sure.”

Last quarter of 2011 was too good for Apple, in which they earn $46.33 billion to be more precise. But there is a question in everyone’s mind that Apple earns more than..?

A new site, Apple made more money than…, answers that question in apparently never-ending string of user submitted facts. At the top of page of the site contain a phrase “Apple made more money than…” to make display some facts. Lots of users have submitted their responses and facts.

Some highlights include:

• 2204 Mitt Romney’s in 2011
• 5.5 times the net worth of Steve Jobs
• Enough to supply everyone on the planet with 147 oreo cookies
• The entire value of apple in 2004
• Twice as much as RIM made the whole year
• Enough to buy every Chinese citizen dinner.
• Eight times the GDP of Somolia
• Nearly 2.5 times the 2010 budget of NASA
• A stack of pennies 41,000 miles high.
• Enough to put 1/10 of high school seniors through college.
• Cost of 203 Boeing 787-9 Dreamliners.
• The value of 72,220 bars of gold.
• The entire yearly defense budget of the U.K.
• The monthly salary of 185 million Foxconn workers.

Definitely a few different and enlightening ways to look at the amount of revenue Apple pulled in last quarter. Perhaps the most eye-opening comparison comes when figuring out how much money the typical Foxconn worker makes in a year. Using the numbers provided, the average Foxconn worker makes $250 a month.

Feel free to include you own “Apple made more money than” facts in the comments.