US import ban on Galaxy Nexus temporarily lifted

A US federal court has ruled that the import ban on the Galaxy Nexus phone must be lifted. This allows Google and Samsung to sell the phone again, but a ban may follow later.

The federal court ruled that the ban on imports of the Galaxy Nexus must be temporarily lifted. In addition, Apple, which had applied for the import ban, will have until Thursday to indicate to the court why the ban should be imposed again. This reverses a decision of a lower court: previously the judge stated that Apple had made it plausible that the Galaxy Nexus infringes its patents, which justified an import ban.

The same court upheld another ban on a Samsung product: the federal court agrees with an earlier judgment in which the judge ruled that the Korean manufacturer may no longer sell its Galaxy Tab 10.1 tablet. However, this ruling has less impact on the company, as a successor has already been released.

The federal court ruling is important for Google, which can now sell the Galaxy Nexus itself again. The device has now also appeared in Google’s Play store again. However, it is still unclear whether the lifting of the import ban will hold. Earlier, the internet giant had already removed the Galaxy Nexus from its web store. Because the device runs on an Android installation that has been fully developed by Google, the ruling may have consequences for the development of the mobile operating system.

To avoid patent infringement in the future, Google will come up with a software update, which should remove the infringing elements. The company also recently announced a new Android release, version number 4.1, which may have taken Apple patents into account. This software will also be released soon for the Galaxy Nexus. In the lawsuit, several patented techniques were mentioned that the Galaxy Nexus would infringe, but infringement of a patent describing a technology for a universal search engine was the most serious factor in the ruling, according to the judge.