Apple Must Provide Samsung With HTC Patent Settlement Details

A California judge this week ordered Apple to provide Samsung with details about its recent patent settlement with HTC.

As reported by Bloomberg, Judge Paul Grewal said Apple had to turn over a copy of the deal, but the document will be for "attorneys eyes only," so details will not be made public.

In explaining his decision, Judge Grewal said similar cases have resulted in documents being handed over. "HTC is not entitled to special treatment," he said.

Earlier this month, that they had settled their long-running patent battle. The deal means the two companies will dismiss all current lawsuits in favor of a 10-year licensing agreement. Apple and HTC said terms of the deal are confidential, but "the license extends to current and future patents held by both parties."

When asked about the deal, Shin Jong-kyun, head of Samsung's mobile and IT division, told reporters in Seoul that Samsung would not be brokering a similar deal. "It may be true that HTC may have agreed to pay 300 billion won (US$276 million) to Apple, but we don't intend to [negotiate] at all," he said.

An that the Apple-HTC deal required HTC to pay $6-8 per phone that used Apple technology, but at that number. "I think that these estimates are baseless and very, very wrong. It is a outrageous number," HTC chief Peter Chou told Reuters.

Apple and Samsung have been fighting over patents since April 2011, when . The case has since expanded to dozens of courts around the globe, but the biggest ruling thus far came in August, when a and handed down damages of $1.05 billion. Samsung is currently appealing.

Prior to the start of the California trial, Samsung and Apple tried several times to hammer out a deal. Apple CEO Tim Cook and Samsung's Choi Gee-Sung and again just days before the trial started, but over the value of each others' patents. Cook then on the phone just before the case went to trial, but to no avail.

The fight could drag on for years; another California suit is not scheduled to go to trial until March 2014.