A German court ordered Apple to stop online sales of its older model iPhones and 3G-enabled iPads, but Apple managed to reverse the ruling within hours. The dust-up stems from a court injunction secured by Motorola Mobility in December after Apple failed to license Motorola wireless patents.
Apple's iPhone 3G, iPhone 3GS and iPhone 4, but not its latest iPhone 4S, were involved in the dispute, as were all 3G models of the iPad, but not the Wi-Fi-only models.
An Apple spokesperson said Motorola repeatedly refused to license its patents on reasonable terms, despite having declared it an industry standard patent seven years ago.
However, Apple may still fall to a separate ruling in Germany related to its iCloud and MobileMe push email service. A court granted Motorola's request for an injunction against Apple's push email service; Motorola argues the products infringe on its patent for a similar paging technology.
"Apple believes this old pager patent is invalid, and we're appealing the court's decision," an Apple spokeswoman told AllThingsD, which noted that Apple is likely to fight the injunction.
The battle between Apple and Motorola is just one of dozens of patent-infringement lawsuits spanning the globe and invovling just about every major smartphone manufacturer.
For more:
- see this Bloomberg article
- see this AllThingsD article
- see this Reuters article
- see this BBC News article
- see this Teltariff.de article (translated via Google Translate)
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