According to this story, Apple has secured (again) the rights to the name iPad in the Chinese market.
What a flipping bargain! It sure seems that Apple’s lawyers earned their salaries on this one. $60M is a small price to pay for the ability to sell iPad’s into China. With the size of that market, Apple will be able to continue its world wide growth for some time.
It brings up a feeling of deja vu for me – I was working at Creative Labs when Apple settled a patent lawsuit with them. Creative Labs had a patent on the scrolling menu system that was used on iPods. (I think it is the same version still being used on current generation iPods.)
The Creative Labs settlement cleared the way for Apple to continue to dominate the personal audio market. The feeling at Creative was one of vindication and pride on being “right.” We really felt that we had stuck it to the Big Bad Apple. Unfortunately, being right didn’t sell any additional Zen players.
If I remember correctly, the fiscal quarter that saw the money arrive from Apple was our only positive quarter in the previous 4-5 quarters. It didn’t get any better after that as future quarters saw us loosing money also.
I left Creative Labs not too long after that, but will always remember the feeling of false hope that the settlement brought…
Matt Gorski 