Post date: Mar 20, 2013 1:51:41 PM
Google's executive chairman, Eric Schmidt, who is on a visit to India, says that Apple is using patent lawsuits to block Samsung's market, while denying people the choice to buy the products of the Korean company.
NEW DELHI, INDIA (MARCH 20, 2013) (ANI) - Google's executive chairman, Eric Schmidt, who is on a visit to India, said on Wednesday (March 20) that Apple was using patent lawsuits to block Samsung's market, while denying people the choice to buy the products of the Korean company.
Apple won a $1.05 billion verdict last August against Samsung, but $450 million was slashed from that amount and a new damages trial was ordered. Apple's request for a permanent sales ban against several Samsung phones was also rejected.Apple has appealed and a ruling is not expected until September at the earliest.
Apple also accused Samsung in a second lawsuit of violating a separate batch of patents, including the rights to search technology that is part of the iPhone Siri voice feature. That case is scheduled for trial in March 2014.
Speaking to mediapersons in New Delhi, Schmidt said that it was only recently that telecommunications companies have started using patent lawsuits to counter healthy competition and called Apple's case on Samsung 'unfair'.
"A number of companies, led by the telecommunications industry decided to use patents to stop innovation. A notable example is Apple sued Samsung in a number of courts trying to essentially not allow Samsung's products into the market. Now, I understand that there is a dispute over patents but to deny people the actual choice, literally you can't even choose our product versus another, strikes me as completely unfair and very much not what the patent system was really about," said Schmidt.
The legal fight has been widely viewed as a proxy war between Apple and Google Inc. Samsung's hot-selling Galaxy smartphones and tablets run on Google'sAndroid operating system.
India has one of the world's youngest Internet population, with 75 percent of users under 35, and many of them have much more disposable income than their parents did.
The executive chairman of Google was quick to point out the untapped source of around 600 million Indians who are yet to join the world wide web.
"India today is not a leader in web services and web programming, even though it has an opportunity to do so. I wonder why not and my guess is the simplest answer, is that the internet and particular connectivity has lacked. So, on the other hand that creates an opportunity. Some numbers are 20 million broadbandconnections, 130 million internet users from a population of 1.3 billion so, roughly speaking 10 percent penetration," Schmidt added.
For many Indians, booking railway tickets online was their introduction to Internet shopping. The government railways ticket booking portal revolutionised the travel industry at a time when buying train tickets meant waiting for long hours at railway counters.
Less than a tenth of India's 1.2 billion population have access to Internet although its 100-odd million users make it the third biggest Internet market after China and the United States. Internet users in India are seen nearly tripling to 300 million over the next three years.
Despite the new rules to block offensive content, India's Internet access is still largely free unlike the tight controls in neighbouring China.