You have to give Samsung credit for trying. In the wake of having its Galaxy Tab 10.1 temporarily banned in Germany, Samsung has apparently modified the tablet in order to get it on store shelves in the country.
According to MobiFlip.de, Samsung is now selling the Galaxy Tab 10.1N. It's not drastically different; patent blogger Florian Mueller pointed to German-language blog allaboutsamsung.de, which said the metal frame or bezel "now wraps all around the edge to the extent that a part of it covers the margins of the front side."
"That is a characteristic of at least one of the devices rejected by the court as prior art," Mueller wrote in a blog post. "It seems to me that this design resulted from teamwork between Samsung's German lawyers and its product design group."
Mueller couldn't say whether this will help Samsung defeat Apple's various patent lawsuits. "But without a doubt, Samsung has upped the ante for Apple and its lawyers in case they wish to request a new injunction or allege that this constitutes an infringement of the existing one," he wrote.
Samsung did not immediately respond to a request for comment, but CyberPort.de is listing a Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1N for €549.
Mueller recommended that Samsung "carefully test the waters and try to find out exactly where the courts draw the line and find an infringement."
In September, the Düsseldorf Regional Court upheld its preliminary injunction against Samsung. The German Galaxy Tab drama started in August when the Dusseldorf court blocked the sale of the Galaxy Tab 10.1 in Europe, with the exception of the Netherlands. Amidst questions over whether a German court had the right to ban a Korean company from selling its wares outside Germany, the court later tightened its ruling and only applied the ban to sales within Germany.
The patent dispute between Apple and Samsung began in April, when Apple sued Samsung for copying the look and feel of its iPhone and iPad in its flagship Galaxy S line of smartphones and tablets, among other devices. Samsung responded with a countersuit that targeted Apple for infringing on five patents relating to wireless networking technology.
The fight has since expanded to more than two dozen cases worldwide, and Samsung is trying to get the iPhone 4S banned in some countries.