Thanks to the pending lawsuit between Samsung Electronics Comp., Ltd. (KSC:005930) and Apple, Inc. (AAPL), round two in the smartphone maker pair's legal war, some details of HTC Corp.'s (TPE:2498) (and subsidiary S3 Graphics') licensing truce with Apple have gone public.
This time around the document was not leaked by Samsung, but rather entered by its attorneys (albeit, in heavily redacted form) legitimately into [PDF] the public record (allowing The Verge to obtain a copy).
The redactions cut out many critical details -- most notably, the royalty rates. However, the language makes it clear that HTC is paying Apple (via wire transfers to an Apple bank account) and not the other way around. This was pretty much well known, but it's at least useful to confirm. The agreement makes it clear that if for some reason HTC does not pay Apple its licensing royalties it can terminate the agreement at will.
Much of the 140 pages (over 100 of them) is devoted to a slew of filings in various international jurisdictions pulling the plug on HTC and Apple's respective lawsuits against each other. Page 37 shows a joint press release, which the companies are strictly ordered is the only statement they can formally release on the truce.
Humorously the agreement asserts "No Partnership" (pg. 27) making it clear that Apple and HTC are not to be known as partners (okay, guys).
Another redacted part is what products are safeguarded by Apple and HTC's promise not to sue each other. But the agreement makes it clear that the joint licensing is non-exclusive, non-transferable, and non-sublicensible.
The agreement does not cover Apple's design patents -- which include U.S. Design Patent No. D618,677 and D593,087 (iPhone), plus the D504,889 (iPad). Nine HTC patents are exempt -- U.S. Patent No. 6,708,214 (hypermedia input), No. 6,473,006 (display of zoomed keypad characters), No. 7,289,772 (status bar), No. 6,868,283 (another status bar patent), No. 7,020,849 ("dynamic" display and labeling), No. 5,418,524 (OTA upgrades), No. 5,630,512 (display and storage container), No. 5,630,159 (UI preferences, etc.), and No. 5,302,947 (another OTA upgrade patent).
The excluded HTC patents thus appear to mostly either deal with UI elements (probably exclusive to HTC Android Sense UI or older handsets, or to over-the-air (OTA) upgrades.
Feel free to look at the document and let us know if there's anything interesting we missed.
And ready yourselves, things may get hairy as Apple and Samsung square off in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California for a second trial, likely to be the biggest battle of next year in the ongoing smartphone war.
Source: SBNation [The Verge] [PDF]
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