There is an ongoing legal battle between Apple and Samsung, although it would seem that Apple could be on the winning side of things as the jury has recently ordered Samsung to pay Apple $120 million in damages. That being said, we doubt that this could be the end of it, and apparently this is a strategy that Samsung has employed over the many years that it has been in business.
In a story published by Vanity Fair, it talks about Samsung’s past legal woes and uncovered a rather disturbing pattern used by the South Korean company, which is where they will infringe upon a competitor’s patent (perhaps knowingly or unknowingly) and will then employ the same tactics they use today to draw it out as long as possible.
There were several examples given, one of which involved Sharp back in 2007 where they sued Samsung for violating patents related to TV technology. Samsung countersued and attempted to drag the case out for as long as possible, all the while continuing to sell their products and establishing their brand. They eventually settled with Sharp in 2009.
The same happened with Pioneer over plasma television technology back in 2006. Both companies went back and forth, which saw Samsung countersuing, appealing, and dragging out the case until 2009 where they reached a settlement. Samsung has also pulled similar tactics on Kodak, which is why we doubt that the legal battle between Apple and Samsung will be going away anytime soon.
Samsung has since managed to establish themselves as the leader in smartphones for the Android market, and in some cases has even managed to beat out Apple, but what do you guys think? On the surface Samsung’s tactics might not seem very ethical, but from a business perspective, it seems to be working out great for them.