It seems like AMD isn’t the only graphics processing unit manufacturer to be involved with legal trouble in recent months. Now, its close rival, Nvidia, is also facing legal disputes with Korean electronics manufacturing powerhouse, Samsung, over several patent infringements. Interestingly, the lawsuit filed against Nvidia doesn’t involve GPUs alone. Instead, Samsung is also suing Nvidia for the mobile processor used in its Shield Tablet.
The legal battles between Nvidia and Samsung have gone a long way. Last year, Samsung decided to sue Nvidia for allegedly manipulating its benchmark scores. However, it didn’t end there. Nvidia then filed a trade complaint against Samsung and Qualcomm which unsurprisingly, didn’t go the way Nvidia wanted it to. One may not be at fault to assume that Nvidia and Samsung have not been on good terms since then.
Recently, Samsung again decided to go on a legal battle with Nvidia. Samsung claimed that Nvidia allegedly infringed three patents that belonged to the company. The case was considered by a judge from the ITC (U.S International Trade Commision) in which the judge ruled that Nvidia was infringing two out of three Samsung patents. However, much to Nvidia’s relief, the decision isn’t final and that one out of the two patents allegedly infringed is due to expire some time in 2016.
If the lawsuit goes Samsung’s way, Nvidia could be facing a sales ban on some of its products. Besides that, if Nvidia is found to violate Samsung’s patents, its clients such as Biostar Microtech International, Jaton Corp and EliteGroup Computer Systems would also be affected. Nvidia responded by mentioning that Samsung’s patents were obsolete since the technology isn’t used in modern chip designs any more.
Despite this, Nvidia’s spokesperson, Hector Martinez, mentioned that although Nvidia finds the judge’s decision disappointing, it remains hopeful and looking forward to the review by the full ITC which will be presented in a few months. There is no guarantee that the case would be settled in a short time since patent-related legal battles usually last from a couple of months to years.
