In Washington, the U.S. Federal Court of Appeals finally released its verdict over an intellectual property infringement case filed by Apple Inc. against Samsung Electronics on Sept. 17, Thursday. The Appelate Court ruling ordered a sales ban of some older smartphone models being sold by Samsung in the U.S.

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As stated in the U.S. News report, U.S. Federal Circuit Judge Kimberly Moore wrote in the majority opinion that Apple did not seek to enjoin the sale of lifesaving drugs but to prevent Samsung from profiting from the unauthorized use of infringing features in its cellphones and tablets.

"Samsung's infringement harmed Apple by causing lost market share and lost downstream sales and by forcing Apple to compete against its own patented invention," the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit also stated.

In a split decision (2-1), the federal court ruled out that Samsung is guilty of violating Apple's iPhone patents by "copying" some of its features and installing them on their smartphones and tablets. These include iPhone's slide-to-lock screen and auto-correct features.

The court decision also ordered Samsung to pay over $600 million in reparation to Apple Inc. However, Samsung is still seeking for some remedies to make the amount much less. Included in the sanction was Samsung's Galaxy S3. On the contrary, its latest model Galaxy S6 was not affected by the court ruling.

The two smartphone giants have been in dispute for the past few years regarding some issues on patents and intellectual property that both manufacturers are using on their phone and tablet models.

As mentioned in the Gizmodo report, a previous conflict transpired back then when Apple's late CEO Steve Jobs accused Google of stealing their iPhone technology and using such innovations on Android, the same operating system being installed by Samsung on their smartphone flagships. Since then, Samsung has been Apple's major competitor in the market when it comes to mobile devices and tablets.

The court also ensured that the general welfare and public interest would not be greatly affected by their decision because the ruling only covers some older and less popular smartphone models.

TagsSamsung Electronics, federal court decision, intellectual property, infringement case