Apple wheels out sueball cannon, again

Apple and Google might have decided on a ceasefire in their global patent mutually-assured-destruction battle, but Cupertino-versus-Korea continues to grind on.

In its latest move, Apple has fired off two new sueballs: one seeks a permanent injunction preventing the sale of now nearly-obsolete Samsung products in the US; the other asks for a retrial over the $119 million damages awarded to it earlier this month.

In this filing seeking the retrial, Apple asks either that damages alone be retried, or that the whole trial be replayed, on the '721 patent (swipe-to-unlock), the '414 data-sync patent, the '959 interface patent, and the '647 “quick links” patent.

The previous decision by Judge Lucy Koh was that Samsung had infringed, but the jury had trimmed Apple's multi-billion damages request to mere hundreds of millions. With a finding of infringement in the bag (unless, of course, Samsung gets that decision overturned), Apple is now arguing that the jury was mis-directed in the matter of damages.

A reassessment of damages in the '647 patent would bruise Samsung the most, since Apple's asking the court to hoist the damages from $US99 million to nearly $US300 million.

In its other filing, Apple asks for permanent sales bans on Samsung Admire, Galaxy Nexus, Galaxy Note, Galaxy Note II, various Galaxy S II variants, Galaxy S III and Stratosphere devices in the US. This would represent a reversal of a decision Judge Koh made in March. ®