A court in England turned down Apple's appeal and ruled that Samsung Galaxy Tab's similarities with iPad do not constitute infringements on Apple's patents in the United Kingdom.
The court order is valid throughout Europe that rules out any further legal disputes between the two companies over the design of tablets in the region. Apple and Samsung, world's two leading smartphone makers, are engaged in a bitter battle over patent infringements in many courts across the globe.
Withholding a British High Court judgment that similarities do not account for patent infringement, the court Judge Judge Robin Jacob said, "It is not about whether Samsung copied Apple's iPad. Infringement of a registered design does not involve any question of whether there was copying: the issue is simply whether the accused design is too close to the registered design according to the tests laid down in the law," the BBC reported.
Citing many features such as "Samsung's logo on the front of its device, while Apple's specs call for no ornamentation on the front of the iThing; the edges of the iPad are sharper, while the case of the Galaxy Tab is thicker; and, in a gloriously English choice of words, Samsung's design is 'altogether busier.'" the court ruled that they do not amount of patent infringement.
The Galaxy Tabs do not have the same understated and extreme simplicity which is possessed by the Apple design," Judge Colin Birss said in an earlier ruling. "They are not as cool. The overall impression produced is different."
In the same ruling, the court asked Apple to run advertisements in major UK websites, magazines and newspapers like the Daily Mail to clearly state that Samsung have not copied from them.
