Though just an indication of wealth at this stage, with the final figures to show-up sometime before October 26th, Samsung has briefed investors to expect third-quarter operating profits of around £4.5 billion.
This is a 25 per cent increase over last quarter's £3.6 billion and more than double the same quarter last year, clearly carrying some of the profits from the firm's highly-successful Galaxy S3 smartphone, which has now sold over 20 million units, looking likely to reach 30 million before the year's end, despite its staggered release, only beginning just over four months ago.
With growth of this magnitude, the £650 million that Apple was awarded against Samsung in recent US patent trials feels somewhat insignificant, with investors tending to agree, seeing Samsung shares rise by 1.5 per cent after the announcement. On the note of trials, Samsung has officially requested a retrial, claiming that there's clear evidence that the jury foreman, Velvin Hogan, likely provided misleading statements to the jury and that he omitted relevant information during jury selection.
As we highlighted ourselves following a BBC interview with Mr Hogan, there was a clear misunderstanding over the concept of design patents, utility patents and prior art and Samsung agrees:
Finally, Mr. Hogan's self-reported conduct during the jury deliberations presents the "reasonable possibility" that extraneous material "could have affected the verdict." In post-verdict interviews with the media, Mr. Hogan said that he told his fellow jurors an accused device infringes a design patent based on "look and feel" that an accused device infringes a utility patent unless it is "entirely different," that a prior art reference could not be invalidating unless that reference was "interchangeable," and that invalidating prior art must be currently in use. These incorrect and extraneous legal standards had no place in the jury room.
It looks as though ramblings between Apple and Samsung are far from over and, with record mobile sales figures, seeing Apple slowly reduce iPhone component reliance on Samsung, the Korean firm is likely to have a lot more bite to its bark than before.
