Qualcomm’s’ response to the smartbook challange

In response, Qualcomm has released the following statement to the Smartbook Blog:

“Qualcomm does not claim and has never claimed to own the term “smartbook,” which it believes is a descriptive and generic term. The term is used by a number of companies, consumers and industry commentators to describe a class of devices that combine attributes of smartphones and netbooks that will be enabled by various technology companies, including Qualcomm.”

Qualcomm noted that the German court has not yet issued a final order, and that its ruling is limited to Qualcomm’s use of the term “smartbook” on Internet sites accessible in Germany without a specified disclaimer. “Qualcomm will have the opportunity to object to the order,” the company noted, adding that it is reviewing the litigation and that “the order does not impact Qualcomm’s services, products, shipments or customers.”

It’s worth noting that Smartbook AG sells at least two products that it identifies as part of a “Smartbook” line. The first is the ”Smartbook ZEN iD,” a 10-inch Atom-based netbook, and the other is the 12.1-inch ”Smartbook Heaven,” an Intel Core 2 Duo-based laptop. Little additional information is currently available about Smartbook AG, which appears to be a far smaller company than Qualcomm, ARM Holdings, Freescale Semiconductor, Texas Instruments and others using the term smartbook.

No doubt the ins and outs of all this will take some time to settle, but whatever the outcome, it seems apparent from recent netbook sales reports that the public’s appetite for smaller, more mobile computing devices – regardless of their name – remains voracious.

Credits : Smartbook Blog