After Apple had a legal beef with Nokia and HTC, it seems that the Taiwanese handset maker is ready to respond, so today they filed a complaint with the United States International Trade Commission. This is HTC’s counter-suit against Apple and they seem to want to halt the importation and sale of the iPhone, iPad and iPod in the States.
HTC mentions that Apple is violating five of its patents, but the company is yet to announce them. This complaint serves as an answer to the two suits filed by Apple in March against the Taiwanese handset maker. At the time, Apple claimed that HTC had infringed no less than 20 patents belonging to the Cupertino giant and related to the iPhone UI, hardware and architecture.
It’s safe to say that Apple’s real target was Google (and Android), not HTC, but the company is the biggest maker of Android phones, so this is the good way to go. The International Trade Commission usually investigates patent infringement involving imported goods, so it will be interesting to watch how this story plays out.
