Swatch Accused Samsung Of Stealing Watchface Designs

Harin - Mar 01, 2019

Just days after its reveal of the new Galaxy Active Watch, Samsung was accused by Swatch of copying trademark watch faces' designs.

Days after Samsung unveiled its Galaxy Watch Active, the third-party developers of the company seems to have copied the designs of their downloadable watch faces from Swatch, a Swiss watchmaker.

Swatch then filled for a lawsuit of $100 million. The complaint contains watches’ images that also appear to be used on Samsung Frontier, Gear S3 Classic, and Gear Sport. You can take a look at the pictures above and below for comparison.

Swatch claims that more than 30 of watchfaces of Samsung were “identical of virtually identical” to its trademarks. The complaint accuses Samsung of foul business practices. Customers might think that Swatch and Samsung had a partnership together when apparently they do not.

These Samsung watchfaces are available for download via the Galaxy Apps store. Third-party developers are behind these designs but Samsung still gets a small percentage of the revenue. Swatch noted that the Jaquet Droz Tropical Bird Repeater, one of the designs, is actually one of a kind and costs around $650,000.

The complaint further states that back in December, Swatch contacted Samsung directly and shared a list of similar watch faces to Samsung’s designs. While these watch faces have since been removed, the phone maker hasn’t done as Swatch wanted. The Korean tech giant still has not admitted that it had copied the watch faces. It also did not agree to assess the Galaxy Apps store.

Even after the Korean giant’s response came, Swatch claims it still saw watches that are similar to those Swatch ones in style and color appear for sale in the Galaxy Apps store. On February 15^th, in its letter, Samsung confirmed that it had removed some of the watch faces but not all of them, which indicated that the message of Swatch wasn’t getting through.

Swatch wrote:

It’s requesting a trial to be held in New York, asking for a compensation of $100 million.

Swatch has already been known for taking legal action when needed. The company has sued Bloomberg for recording an earnings call, Tiffany & Co for not respecting a business deal, and Target for copying watch designs. Reports surfaced that ever since 2012, 173 smartwatch-related patents have been filed by the Swiss watchmaker.