LG Officially Accuses Apple iPhone For “Copying” Prada Concept Design
- By Administrator -
- Feb 16, 2007 |
- Gadget News,
- Legal,
- Mobile Phone News
According to reports, LG Electronics is alleging Apple of stealing the concept of its much-hyped iPhone from LG’s own Prada model.
As per a Korean website, Woo-Young Kwak, head of LG Mobile Handset R&D Center, at a press conference said, “We consider that Apple copied Prada phone after the design was unveiled when it was presented in the iF Design Award and won the prize in September 2006. We take that to mean ‘Apple stole our idea.”
Though, the Apple’s iPhone and LG’s Prada were both launched around the same time, and sport quite similar appearances, it was pretty vague as to which company held the original design concept and which company had copied it. However, now LG has publicly stated that Apple has copied theirs. Though, there is no news of a lawsuit against Apple yet.
Experts have pointed out that the two phones differ in many aspects. The KE850 Prada phone, which claims to be the world’s ‘first completely touch screen mobile phone’, is a tri-band GSM handset with EDGE support, unlike the quad-band iPhone. It has a small 3-inch screen, with a resolution of 240×400, while the iPhone’s display is .5 inch larger, with a 320×480 resolution. Also, the KE850′s user interface is flash-based, whereas the iPhone runs OSX. Moreover, the Prada has Bluetooth 2.0, unlike the iPhone, which has WiFi capability.
Following the launch of Apple’s iPhone in January, many Internet users debated over the similarities between the two handsets. However, Apple still insists that they’ve been working on the iPhone for a long time filing 200 patents.
There has been speculation in the media that Apple apparently saw the pictures of the LG Prada phone floating around Internet photo sharing sites like Flickr and decided to launch the iPhone a week ahead of its original schedule.
The LG KE850 Prada is expected to sell for around US$780 which makes it steeper than the iPhone’s estimated $699.
Lawsuits just do not seem to leave Apple. The company lost a patent lawsuit with Creative Technology, over the user interface of the iPod. Apple ended up paying $100 million to the company for copyright infringement. Then Cisco sued Apple for trademark infringement of iPhone name, and now LG is all battles against the Cupertino, CA-based company.
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Readers Comments
February 16th, 2007 at 11:31 am
Yeah, right.
Well for a start it was always going to be the launch at Macworld – no week in advance launch for the iphone.
So Apple nicked the idea and managed to turn around a working prototype in 3 months – my god I’m impressed that Apple can do that…
Posted By: RattyUK
February 16th, 2007 at 11:56 am
The iPhone has bluetooth and WI-FI and will retail for 499.00 and 599.99 not 699.99
Posted By: gary
February 16th, 2007 at 1:18 pm
Did Apple lose the case with Creative or did they settle. Two different things.
Posted By: MP
February 16th, 2007 at 1:52 pm
“Moreover, the Prada has Bluetooth 2.0, unlike the iPhone, which has WiFi capability”
The iPhone has bluetooth AND WiFi.
Posted By: Avery
February 16th, 2007 at 1:58 pm
LG should be embarrassed to keep trying to attach their sub-par phone to the iPhone’s coat-tails like this. First off, IT ISN’T AVAILABLE YET – pretty hard to copy something that doesn’t even exist yet, isn’t it? Secondly, what, exactly did Apple supposedly copy?!? The fact that it looks like a phone? Duh. Yes it uses a touch screen… there are other phones out there that use a touch screen too. Does the Prada support “mutil-touch” – No. Does it provide the same features and user-interface to photos, music, podcasts, video, and the internet? No. LG has egg on their face because they realized they are releasing an upmarket phone that now appears to have down-market features while retaining its ridiculous price.
Posted By: Brad
February 16th, 2007 at 3:14 pm
“World’s first completely touch screen mobile phone”. Huh?!?
Funny, aren’t those “send” and “end’ buttons on the bottom of the front?!? Aren’t those volume and mode buttons on the side?!?
So, how, exactly is a mobile phone with buttons a “completely touch screen mobile phone”?
As for copying the design: try looking at an iPod sometime!!
Posted By: Scott
February 16th, 2007 at 4:14 pm
Uhhh, Apple did not “lose” the patent case – they settled with Creative out of court, before the case could go to trial. How can you “lose” a case that hasn’t been tried.
Now, who got the better end of the deal is another question, but writing that Apple “lost a patent lawsuit with Creative” is a mischaracterization and sloppy journalism.
Secondly, LG claiming that Apple copied the Prada phone is laughable. Who cares if their phone is tri-band and Apple’s is quad-band? That’s not what makes the phones significantly different! Typical techie response to focus on minute differences.
The big differences are in the software and approach. LG’s phone obviously doesn’t have multi-touch. Multi-touch is a combination of unique hardware (the screen) and software and I seriously doubt a single-point touch screen that is probably in the LG’s device can be hacked to do multi-touch without LG replacing the screen hardware.
It’s like, have you noticed that all LG’s refridgerators look very similar to Samsung or GE? How about the fact that nearly all microwaves have – *GASP* – a touch-sensitve pad with similar layouts! OMIGOD! It seems even toaster companies are ripping off LG’s designs these days!!! Who knew?
So can we please end this nonsense about “copying” obvious and non-copyrightable ideas like phones with touch-sensitive screens?
Posted By: Paul
July 9th, 2008 at 4:29 am
First of all who gives a sh!@ about the iphone in the first place. the device has more cons than pros and the call quality is less than tolerable. And god forbid it needs to be serviced for ANY reason doesnt matter what it is, its a very painful process. I also think settling out of court for 100 million dollars is a LOSS no matter how you look at it. Whether it was in a trial or out of court a 100 million dollar payout is a huge loss, and somewhat of admitting fault, to an extent. LG may have devices that resemble other devices in LOOKS whether it be a stove, mobile phone, A/C, microwave etc.. the difference is quality. I have worked with numerous electronics and I have to say LG makes pretty reliable devices that are more clear for video, clarity for voice and robust for data. Apple should just stick too pissing off microsoft and leave the mobile phone buisness altogether.
Posted By: Randy