Nokia takes a bite out of Apple in IP dispute.

After almost two years of litigation, yesterday, Nokia Oyj settled their dispute with Apple Inc. A settlement was reached awarding the Finnish phone people a one time payment from Apple and royalties on all iPhones sold since release.  Although the settlement figures are undisclosed, Apple’s first payment is expected to be in the hundreds of millions, based on the 200m iPhones sold since 2007. But will this save the worlds largest mobile phone manufacturer from its steady decline? Yesterday’s win triggered a share value increase of 15 cent for Nokia, which was welcome news.  The company’s value has dropped by 75 per cent since iPhone’s entry to the market four years ago.  Nokia’s forthcoming plans involve the release of a range of Windows 7 powered handsets with partners Microsoft in attempt to win back some of the market share lost to Android and iPhone sales. The agreement will bolster the second-quarter profitablity of Nokia’s devices and services unit, the company said Tuesday. However, Nokia just announced they are ceasing trading through their UK online retail store and are rumored to follow this by closing web stores serving the US also.  This comes just months after the closure of online stores across France, Spain and the Netherlands. Nokia’s case began in late 2009, when they filed a lawsuit against the Californian based tech giant, claiming technology patents were breached in the areas of: wireless data, speech coding and encryption, followed by touchscreen wiping gestures, which later extended to iPod touch and iPad.  Nokia claimed that similar patents were filed over ten years before iPhone’s release. After Nokia’s win, both sides of the argument agreed to withdraw complaints against each other over intellectual property through the International Trade Commission.  Yesterday, Apple said that Nokia will have a license to some technology, “but not the majority of the innovations that make the iPhone unique.”  Apple gets a license to some of Nokia’s patents, some of which were deemed essential to industry standards on mobile phones. “We’re glad to put this behind us and get back to focusing on our respective businesses,” Apple spokesperson Steve Dowling. Now there’s more to innovate than just this stage, so why not join innovatrs and find out? And if you’re ready to get your product out there, why not submit a brief for some marketing support and campaigns?