Innovation. Apple or Samsung?

In a suit headed to trial next week, Apple will ask for $2.5 billion on claims that Samsung copied features of the iPad and iPhone in some of its Galaxy products. 

The thought of these two corporate gladiators clashing in a legal coliseum, and Apple with more than $100 billion in cash, is enough to make innovators reluctant to innovate. Either gladiator could crush a business with legal briefs.  Never forget the nominal price of innovation must include the phenomenal price to protect it. 

My view is that this litigation is not so much about iPhones or iPads, it is about TVs. Apple wants into the TV market, dominated by Samsung, and wants Samsung to let them in without litigation. 

Apple and Samsung will ultimately split the smartphone market and the TV market too.

Watch for this litigation to be settled about the same time Apple starts selling TVs.