Judge Lucy Koh of the United States District Court for the Northern District of California determined on Sunday that Apple and Samsung will return to the courtroom to battle a retrial of their famous design patent damages case, which is exactly what the South Korean company has been fighting for.
Samsung had originally, as noted by Foss Patents, asked Judge Koh for a retrial of its previous case against Apple, to which she denied, then went on to convince the Supreme Court that the terms of its previous ruling were incorrect, later resulting in her deciding that a retrial is on the cards.
Apple and Samsung have until Wednesday, October 25 to propose a case schedule and a retrial date; however, there's a chance, albeit a small one, the conglomerates will never make it into the courtroom, as both parties have the option to settle the dispute outside of the legal system.
Apple will be hoping for a per-device ruling
It's unlikely it will go down that route, though. The Supreme Court decided last year that Samsung had to pay Apple damages for design patents infringed on an individual component basis, a decision that could have netted the firm half a billion dollars. A per-device payment could land it billions.
Apple is going to want to do everything it can to persuade the United States District Court to rule that Samsung has to pay it damages for every device it sold, while the latter will be hoping for a different result, in which it won't have to pay anywhere near as much—if anything at all.
