Will Samsung, Apple end 3-year patent war?

After fierce legal battles over patents of smartphone and tablet PCs, Samsung Electronics and Apple are drawing keen attention in the wake of the recent withdrawal of their respective appeals to appellate court.

According to the information technology industry and Fos Patents, a German blog dedicated to intellectual property on Sunday, Samsung Electronics revoked its appeal to a ruling by the U.S. International Trade Commission to a federal appellate court on Thursday, while Apple also withdrew its appeal on the same ruling on Friday.

The two companies have withdrawn their appeals on the ITC ruling that Samsung violated two of the six technology patents Apple filed suit with against Samsung, and the commission’s resulting decision to ban on import of certain products.

Specifically, the patents that Samsung is found to have violated are "heuristics," dubbed “Steve Jobs patent," and the function to recognize the microphone within the plug at earphones. Heuristics is the application that gets one’s finger touches to be reflected by using user’s information even when figures do not touch accurately. Samsung’s products that ITC imposed import bans are “the Galaxy S,” “the Galaxy S2,” “the Galaxy Nexus,” and “the Galaxy Tab.”

Analysts say that the withdrawal of the appeals against ITC ruling may have provided a turning point for the two tech giants to end a prolonged “patent war," which lasts almost three years.

By referring to last month`s shift in Apple’s stance to conciliatory mode in its relationship with Google, which had been hostile, some analysts said Apple could seek to improve ties with Samsung as well. At the time, Apple and Google issued a joint statement suggesting "they directly agreed to revoke all lawsuits that exist."

In contrast, other watchers say that the two firms’ withdrawal of ITC ruling does not entail special meaning. The products that are subject to import bans are all old models and have effectively lost flagship stature, while Samsung has already been supplying products using technologies other than those Apple appealed with to stage offensives. It means that the appeals of ITC ruling itself hold little meaning.

A source in the IT industry said, “Samsung and Apple could have revoked their appeals as they recognized that appeals against ITC ruling over products that have no influence on the market are no longer meaningful.”

However, majority of watchers in the IT sector believe that Samsung and Apple, the two pillars in the mobile market, apparently have internal interest in resolving conflict. An industry source said, “There is a chance that the two companies will make moves to resolve the issue.”