SAN JOSE – Users of Samsung products said they would pay as much as $100 extra per smartphone or tablet to get features covered in three Apple patents, according to a survey done for Apple.
Users would pay $100 extra for a smartphone or $90 more for a tablet that had features described in Apple’s ‘915, ‘163 and ‘381 patents at issue in its suit against Samsung here, said John Hauser, a market research expert, professor at the MIT Sloan School of Management and witness for Apple.
Users would pay $39-$45 for just the features on the ‘915 patent which covers use of a reverse-pinch gesture to zoom into content. The ‘163 patent covers use of a double tap to zoom, and the ‘381 covers a bounce-back feature that in a playful way lets user know when they have scrolled to the end of content.
“I concluded Samsung consumers are willing to pay a substantial price premium for features associated with the Apple patents in this case,” said Hauser.
Apple presented testimony of the conjoin survey in just a few minutes with minimal description. Judge Lucy H. Koh has limited both sides to a total of 25 hours of time before a jury.
Samsung attorney William Price asked Judge Koh to throw out the evidence because Apple did not take time to describe to the jury the details of the survey or its methodology.
“Now I have to describe the whole survey--that’s not my burden,” said Price.
Koh denied the request.
“Did you teach this jury what you did in this survey?” Price then asked Hauser.
“It’s a good survey, and I think the numbers make sense,” Hauser replied. “I believe the direct examination got the message across,” he later added.
The survey showed consumers animations of the features in question. Price noted Hauser did not show those animations to patent experts to verify they reflected the features described in the Apple patents.
Price also suggested the survey was flawed because it had no checks on whether it would be realistic to charge as much as the survey said users would pay. For instances, iPad users typically pay $100 for an extra 8 Gbytes of memory, he noted.
“You could have checked if the market figures you suggested were realistic,” Price said.
“That’s more complicated than you put on,” said Hauser.
In addition, Price noted the amount users said they would pay does not directly reflect what consumers would actually spend in the market. “So [the numbers] do not indicate what people would actually pay in the market place, is that correct?” Price asked.
“This relates to it, but it is not it,” Hauser said.
The otherwise tense cross-exam had a lighter moment when Price asked how much Apple paid Hauser. The consultant said his rate was $800/hour but he did not know how many hours he had billed Apple to date.
“I wish I could call my wife,” Hauser said.
“Sometimes we have to check with our spouses,” retorted Price who had contended the survey was flawed because users were asked about purchasing decisions without consulting his or her spouse.