It looks like Samsung is engaging in some real outside-the-box thinking when it comes to new ways of avoiding costly Apple lawsuits. PhoneArena has spotted a slew of design patents that were recently awarded to Samsung, and one of them… well, let’s just say it looks suspiciously like a certain device that has proven to be very popular over the years.
As you can see in the design patent diagram posted above, the proposed Samsung device features a round home button at the bottom that’s a change from the standard oval home button we’re used to seeing on Samsung phones. The device also appears to have more defined edges than your typical Samsung device, as the Korean smartphone titan has usually gone with more rounded edges for its smartphones’ frames.
We feel like we’ve seen this kind of design somewhere before but we can’t quite put our fingers on it… oh right, here it is:
PhoneArena says that Samsung’s design shown in the patent “reminds a whole lot of the Apple iPhone’s,” which is certainly true. The device shown in the diagram doesn’t have the same speaker and front-facing camera setup that we see on top of the iPhone 5s, which is something Samsung can hang its hat on to claim that the patented design isn’t exactly like the iPhone’s. Other than that, though, the resemblance is awfully striking.
Be sure to check out PhoneArena’s full gallery of Samsung design patents by clicking the source link below.
UPDATE: TechnoBuffalo points out that this particular patent actually belongs to LG, not Samsung, despite the fact that it was listed in Samsung’s search results on the USPTO’s website. So it looks like Samsung is off the hook this time for alleged copycatting.
