Apple wins its slide to unlock patent dispute against Motorola

A GERMAN COURT has ruled in favour of Apple against Motorola in a patent lawsuit over its slide to unlock feature.

The result of the case, for the meantime at least, is that most of Motorola's devices infringe Apple's patent. The ruling means that Apple can enforce an injunction against infringing devices.

However, Motorola has developed an alternative method that means its sales won't be hit. A Motorola product found not to infringe was the Xoom table, which uses an unlock circle, according to a patents blog.

Motorola said, "Today's ruling in the patent litigation brought by Apple in Munich, Germany, concerns a software feature related to phone unlocking in select Motorola devices sold in Germany. Motorola has implemented a new design for the feature. Therefore, we expect no impact on current supply or future sales."

Apple has declined to comment on the news.

This specific case related to only some of Motorola's devices, so it doesn't directly affect other Android or non-Android devices.

At the beginning of this month Motorola won an injunction against the fruit themed firm's Ipad and Iphone, again in Germany. However, the victory was short lived as Apple got the ban suspended by appealing.

Update
Motorola has confirmed that it will appeal the court's ruling. µ