Edible Apple

Perhaps seeing the writing on the wall after the ITC found HTC handsets to infringe on a number of Apple patents, the Taiwanese based handset manufacturer has expressed a willingness to strike up a licensing agreement with Apple.

In a telephone interview with Bloomberg today, HTC’s CFO Winston Yung explained, “We have to sit down and figure it out. We’re open to having discussions. We are open to all sorts of solutions, as long as the solution and the terms are fair and reasonable. On and off we’ve had discussions with Apple, even before the initial determination came out.”

Interesting stuff, and certainly a departure from HTC’s previous posturing where it vowed to fight off all of Apple’s patent attacks with vigor.

Still, and as we’ve pointed out previously, Apple’s goal here isn’t to reach a licensing agreement with HTC, they’re trying to stop the Android freight train from picking up steam.

Apple’s iOS platform may still reign supreme, but Android is serious competition and getting a few bucks per Android handset may help Apple’s bottom line, but Apple’s real goal is to use its patent portfolio to stymie the growth of Android.

via Bloomberg