The shadow of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs loomed large at the opening of the tech giant's "patent battle of the century" against Samsung in California on Tuesday.
The shadow of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs loomed large at the opening of the tech giant's "patent battle of the century" against Samsung in California on Tuesday.
District judge Lucy Koh was forced to declare: "I really don't think this is a trial about Steve Jobs."
But Judge Koh ruled that Apple's opening presentation to jurors would be allowed to contain photographs of Jobs, who died of cancer last October. Lawyers for Samsung had argued that the plan to include such pictures was "gratuitous".
It was the second victory that Apple scored over the role of its co-founder in a trial that could have major repercussions for the smart phone industry. At a hearing last week, Apple managed to exclude from the trial comments Jobs made shortly before he died, that he was prepared to go "thermonuclear" on Google's Android operating system, which is used in Samsung phones.
The iPhone maker is suing Samsung for more than $2.5 billion (pounds 1.6 billion) to recover money it alleges the Korean company made using its "intellectual property" by copying the design of the iPhone and iPad.
Samsung, which has a larger share of the global smart phone market than Apple, has in turn alleged that Apple is infringing five patents and wants royalties. It claims that the Californian company is attempting to thwart competition so it can keep generating "exorbitant" profits.
The skirmishes over Jobs came at the start of a trial that is expected to last four weeks. Judge Koh and lawyers for both sides selected the jury from an original field of 74 people drawn from an area that is not far from where Apple is based in Cupertino, California.
The jurors, who include a social worker, an employee in a bike shop and a mechnical engineer, were quizzed on whether they knew anyone who worked at Apple, which type of phone they owned and whether they had read the recent biography of Jobs by Walter Isaacson.
Lawyers for Apple allege that Samsung used to design its own phones, but now their phones and tablets "not only look like Apple's iPhone and iPad, they use Apple's patented software features to interact with the user". Samsung contends that its phones and others using Google's Android operating system offer consumers "an alternative to Apple's single, expensive and closed-system devices".
Despite many western economies struggling to grow, the smartphone industry has enjoyed explosive growth over the past three years as more people ditch PCs for mobile devices.
Lawyers warned that, given the scale of what is at stake, this may not be the last court battle.
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