Supreme Court favors Samsung over Apple in patent case

NEW YORK (AA) – The Supreme Court ruled Tuesday in favor of Samsung in a patent case the company had against Apple.

The California-based tech giant claimed in 2011 that design features of its iPhone models were copied by Samsung's mobile phones, and demanded damages from the South Korean company on grounds that it infringed on a design-patent.

Two lower courts have since decided in favor of Apple and ruled Samsung should pay $399 million in damages -- derived from total profits of Samsung phones sold.

Samsung challenged the decisions, saying the amount was "disproportionate" and claimed Apple is not entitled to total profits from its entire phone line, but only to profits from components that infringes on its patent design.

In the unanimous 8-0 ruling, the Supreme Court said design-patent is a wide definition to decide whether total profits from an entire phone line should be paid in damages of infringement.

"The term 'article of manufacture' is broad enough to embrace both a product sold to a consumer and a component of that product," Justice Sonia Maria Sotomayor said in a statement.

She said in the case of a multi-component product like high-tech cell phones, "damages award need not be the end product sold to the consumer but may be only a component of that product".

The Supreme Court sent the case back to the lower courts where damages are expected to be calculated not based on the end product sent to customers but by the phone’s components.

Samsung is estimated to pay much less than $399 in damages, according to experts.