Sunday, March 31, 2013
Post 15 iPhone 5S and its design rumors
According to sources from the upstream supply chain of Apple phone, the new iPhone 5S will not receive a major upgrade and may just be a slightly enhanced version of iPhone 5. The conclusion is drawn by citing their latest specification data. Meanwhile, there are also rumors stating that Apple also plans to release an iPhone model using plastic chassis to push its global smartphone market share, the sources added.
There are rumors that to offset the cost and make the price to be more competitive, Apple's new phone will have a plastic shell rather than metal casing. While Apple has not commented on any of these reports, it would be interesting to see the the adoption of plastic shell will trigger the design patent infringement cases with Samsung. Samsung Galaxy smartphone products are currently the major opponent of Apple's iPhone products. Due to the result of Samsung vs. Apple patent law case in 2012, Samsung was ordered to pay Apple $1.05 billion (which recently changed to $599 million) for multiple patent infringements. One major patent infringement involves the smartphone outer case design. Although the shape of the phone is the main focus of design patents, I think by choosing plastic case, the new Apple iPhone may be too similar to the Samsung Galaxy phone.
Note that Samsung's phone design has infringed the Apple iPhone design. Now if Apple iPhone uses the same material (high-end plastic) as Samsung Galaxy phones, I believe it would bring more controversy to the design patent infringement.
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With the benefit of hindsight, it seems that the iPhone 5S and 5C did not change that much from the iPhone 5 design, and did not result in any notable design infringement suits. I agree that phone design suits seem to be a common theme in the space, given the plethora of suits flying around between each hardware and software mobile company. However, in the face of all of the confusion, I think that the best strategy for mobile manufacturers and designers is to just develop the phone that they think will best meet customers' needs, and fight off suits as they come, rather than try to design their phones around the design patents that they and other companies have filed.
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