European nation disallows for Samsung Galaxy Phone

Samsung has been excluded from selling three models of its Galaxy Smart-phones in most of the European states.

The initial ban was handed down by a court in the Netherlands after Apple put up a case containing a claim for copyright violation.

It declared that Samsung had imitated technology possessed by Apple associating to the way photos are showed on mobile devices.

The ban is due to come into effect in seven weeks.

A district court in the Hague upheld Apple's say concerning one special copyright - EP 2059868 - which sketches an interface for viewing and navigating images on a touch-screen phone.

However, the judge discarded numerous other patent matters; including Apple's argues that Samsung had stolen several of its design plans.

The verdict does not forbid sales of the Samsung Galaxy Tab, which had been quoted in the genuine lawsuit.

In spite of the coming ban, Samsung greeted the verdict. In a statement, the company said: "Today's verdict is a confirmation that the Galaxy series of products is pioneering and unique.

"With regard to the single contravention mentioning in the ruling, we will take all possible steps including legal action to make sure that there is no commotion in the availability of our Galaxy smartphones to Dutch clients."

The company shows to believe that the decision only directly confines the sale of Galaxy smartphones in the Netherlands.

"This ruling is not anticipated to affect sales in other European markets," the statement sustained.

Like various technology companies, Samsung utilizes the Netherlands to import most of its accessories into the European Union.

The provisional ruling bans sale of devices by three of the company's Dutch subsidiaries to the UK, France, Germany, Finland, Ireland, Lichtenstein, Luxemburg, Monaco, Sweden and Switzerland.

Copyright proceedings blogger Florian Mueller said that Samsung's distribution model intended the embargo effectively amounts to a de facto European-wide ban.

"If Samsung's Korean parent company desires to work out its sovereignty to ship into other European countries in spite of this ban, it will have to know its logistics chain in Europe accordingly.