Intellectual property is what companies use to protect algorithms, product design and certain things that the public never see but use on a daily basis. Every time you do a google search you are using a piece of software code that is arguably one of the most secret pieces of information in the world. Intellectual property can be seen as the things that provide companies a competitive edge over their competition. It is protected by the law and if found to be violated offending individuals and companies can expect fines of epic proportions.
In my last post I mentioned Samsung being a very big supplier for Apple. Flash memory and internal memory are provided to Apple. However the supplier relationship has not saved Samsung from being sued by Apple for blatant IP and copyright violations.
It seems that Apple have 2 major issues with Samsung. The “blatant” copy of product design for Galaxy range (tablet and smart phones) and the TouchWiz software that is found on certain Samsung smart phones seems to be the problem for Apple. If you have used iTunes then there is a degree of similarity between that and Touchwiz. The icons are similar. Even the product packaging has come under scrutiny from Apple.
The bigger problem is that Apple feel that Samsung have copied many design elements seen in the iPad and iPhone:
- The rectangular product shape with all four corners uniformly rounded;
- The front surface of the product dominated by a screen surface with black borders;
- As to the iPhone and iPod touch, substantial black borders above and below the screen having roughly equal width and narrower black borders on either side of the screen having roughly equal width;
- As to the iPad, substantial black borders on all sides being roughly equal in width;
- A metallic surround framing the perimeter of the top surface;
- A display of a grid of colorful square icons with uniformly rounded corners; and
- A bottom row of square icons (the “Springboard”) set off from the other icons and that do not change as the other pages of the user interface are viewed.
It is really simple, Apple are trying to ensure that the user experience remains unique to their products and are not found anywhere else. It makes sense and the innovation and design process that Apple use is not free, it costs money (millions of dollars) and they don’t want anyone piggy backing on their products. It will be interesting to see what Samsung do about this matter and how it impacts the relationship it has with Apple.
