Apple vs. Samsung Legal Battle Heads Back to Original Court

After a lengthy battle in the courts, the Apple versus Samsung story has taken quite an interesting turn: They returned to the same court where the legal wrangle originally started, the district court in San Jose, California.

On Tuesday the federal court ordered that the patent dispute be sent to a lower court to decide whether it will hold another damages retrial or other actions, reports CNET.

That’s pretty interesting considering that Apple and Samsung have been fighting over patents since 2012, and later about how much the South Korean smartphone manufacturer should pay in damages for infringing Apple’s design patents.

“We look forward to making our case at the district court and prevailing on behalf of all those who promote creativity, innovation and fair competition in the marketplace,” Samsung said in a statement.

The case went all the way up to the Supreme Court, where, in December last year, it was ruled that damages for the patent infringement could be based only on the part of the device that violated Apple’s design patents.

The ruling reshaped the previous damages award, which was collected on the entire profits of an infringing device. As a result, Samsung paid $339 million to Apple last year.

Now, the Supreme Court’s ruling doesn’t give any guidance on how the damages should be decided. Apple asked the appeals court to uphold the earlier damages, saying that Samsung never showed an “article of manufacture”, while Samsung wanted the case sent back to the district court for a new damages trial.

It is up to the district court to decide whether a new trial is needed.