Apple beefs up its legal team for patent wars

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Apple Inc. is hiring up an army of legal beagles to help it in its fight against other smart phone makers, as the giants of the mobile space begin to slug it out in the International Trade Commission’s courts.
A report in Bloomberg says Apple has been snapping up some of the United State’s top legal talent when it comes to patent laws as outside counsel, as well as beefing up its in-house council by hiring a full time attorney to focus on intellectual property litigation.
Bloomberg notes that since it introduced the iPhone in 2007, Apple has become the most-sued technology company, hardly a coveted title in the valley or anywhere else. Steve Jobs, not the type to lay back on his laurels, however, has decided to go on a lawyer hiring spree to help defend his company’s assets,  recruiting lawyers who have fought – and won – for and against some of the biggest technology firms in the game, including Microsoft Corp., Intel Corp. and Broadcom Corp.
Some analysts believe the upcoming battles Apple faces before the ITC could be just the opening shots in what may well turn into a full-blown war for dominance in the U.S. smart phone market.
In fairness, Apple has been on the defensive from the get-go, with Finnish phone maker Nokia Corp. actually the firm to throw the first punch at the Cupertino, Calif.-based firm. In October 2009 Nokia sued Apple for allegedly infringing on Nokia patents, something the company reaffirmed when it filed a trade complaint in December of that year too.
Apple vehemently denied the Finnish firm’s charges, saying Nokia was just trying to force it to give up precious proprietary technology which differentiates the iPhone from competitors – a charge Nokia unsurprisingly denies.
Playing by tech playground rules, Apple retaliated to Nokia’s lawsuits with some of its own, filing charges that, actually, Nokia had infringed on Apple’s patents with Symbian and should be blocked from selling its phones on the U.S. market.
So far, the ICT doesn’t seem to have found much merit in either Apple or Nokia’s claims.
Nokia isn’t the only firm bringing Apple to task though. Once that dispute resolves itself one way or another, Apple can look forward to its next rounds with Motorola Inc. and HTC Corp., its rivals playing in the Android space.
Will it make a difference to the consumer at the end of the day? Probably not. But it certainly is going to make a lot of lawyers very rich indeed.