According to multiple in-court reports, Samsung opened up week three of the second Apple v. Samsung patent trial by forwarded its argument that the Korean company’s massive success in the smartphone industry owes to strong marketing, not alleged copying of Apple’s patented iPhone features. Executive Youngmi Kim, a senior UI designer who has worked on Samsung’s user experience team since 2004 vehemently denied the notion that her company’s software borrowed from Apple’s designs, reports Re/code.
Did Samsung steal its slide-to-unlock feature from Apple’s smartphone software? “Absolutely not,” said Samsung senior UI designer Youngmi Kim, who has worked on user experience strategy on the Samsung design team since 2004. “If we were to work on the same thing as Apple, that would not give us any advantage in terms of differentiating our products, so that would not make any sense,” Kim said, speaking through a translator. Apple’s patent on slide-to-unlock is one of five over which Apple has sued Samsung, saying that the Korean electronics giant owes it more than $2 billion for using its patented technology in various phones and tablets. Samsung denies its products infringe and also says the patents at issue are invalid. Meanwhile, it has countersued Apple for infringing on two of its patents.
