Apple’s long-drawn out legal battle with Samsung just hit a new milestone. A jury presiding over the case has ordered Samsung to pay Apple $539 million for violating its design patents of the iPhone when creating some of its early smartphones between 2010 and 2011.
First reported by CNET, the restitution breaks down into two sums: Samsung was ordered to pay Apple $533,316,606 for violating three design patents and an additional $5,325,050 for violating two utility patents. The total sums comes out to north of $539 million.
The legal battle between Apple and Samsung has been going on for many years now. Two years ago, Samsung was ordered to pay Apple $399 million for violating patents but the South Korean conglomerate appealed to the Supreme Court and earned victory by a redetermination of damages to be paid out in a retrial.
During the new trial, Samsung was seeking a $28 million settlement while Apple was arguing for $1 billion. The new amount to be paid out came in right around the middle of those two figures and very much in Apple’s favor, higher than the previous amount Samsung was ordered to pay out.
It’s not entirely clear what the next step of the battle will be. Samsung says it will consider other options to the outcome, which means it might appeal once again while Apple seems very content with the ruling, stating, “It is a fact that Samsung blatantly copied our design. We’re grateful to the jury for their service and pleased they agree that Samsung should pay for copying our products.”
