WITH numerous rivals to the iPhone expected to be launched at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, next week, Apple says it will defend the device鈥檚 touch-screen technology should anybody dare to copy it. But an aggressive legal battle would be a mistake, say technology analysts.
On an iPhone, you can zoom in on part of the screen by moving two fingers apart and zoom out by moving them back together. Apple acquired this multi-touch technology along with a collection of patents when it bought a firm called FingerWorks.
Until early January, only the iPhone had multi-touch technology, but both Palm (left) and Toshiba have since announced multi-touch phones. Geoff Blaber, an analyst at market research firm CCS Insight in London, says he expects many more multi-touch phones to emerge at Barcelona 鈥� largely based on Google鈥檚 Android open-source software platform.
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Firms like Palm and Nokia have their own patent portfolios on these technologies, Blaber adds: 鈥淭here are often workarounds that let firms achieve the same touch-screen capabilities in different ways. Who owns the intellectual property is unclear 鈥� it鈥檚 very murky territory.鈥�
Blaber suggests Apple would be unwise to mount a lawsuit. 鈥淚t would be a very dangerous move for Apple to begin robustly defending patents here because it is a very new area.鈥� Such action could prompt rivals to file costly counter-suits, he says.
鈥淚t would be a very dangerous move for Apple to begin robustly defending its patents鈥�
