The injunction hearing between
Apple Inc.
(
AAPL
) and
Google Inc.
's (
GOOG
) Motorola Mobility is now scheduled to take place on June 20. This
comes after the U.S. Circuit Judge Richard A. Posner cancelled the
aforesaid trial that was scheduled to take place on June 11,
according to Bloomberg.
Apple had earlier filed a lawsuit against Motorola Mobility
related to the infringement of four of its patents. Apple had
sought an injunction to bar the sale of Motorola products that
includes Droid phones and Xoom tablets in the US.
Motorola Mobility has claimed that Apple too had infringed upon
one of its patents related to cellular communications. It is
interesting to note that Google had acquired Motorola Mobility for
$12.5 billion primarily to get its hands on the significant number
of communications patents that Motorola has amassed over the
years.
Apple has been very particular about stalling the growth of the
android-based operating system. In doing so, it has engaged in
legal battles in different countries, particularly against
Samsung.
Samsung is leveraging on Android to become one of its most
significant competitors and the company is already the largest
vendor of Android-based products. The fact that Android is expected
to continue its very strong growth all over the world is a major
headache for Apple.
Despite the threat from Android and lower-than-expected sales in
the tablet market, Apple has maintained its leading position in
this arena in the first quarter of 2012. However, in the smartphone
market, Android has outrun Apple's iOS in the first quarter 2012,
according to IDC.
We believe that Apple remains the biggest growth story based on
its product pipeline, popular apps, iCloud and iPhone 4S, and the
new iPad and Apple TV, and loyal customer base. With a solid
balance sheet and robust revenues, we expect Apple to outperform
its peers in the long run.
We believe that Apple's legal hassles will continue as
competition heats up in the smartphone and tablet space.
We maintain our Outperform recommendation over the long term
(6-12 months). Currently, Apple has a Zacks #2 Rank, which implies
a Buy rating in the near term.
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