In March 2010 Apple acquired the "iPad" Trademark from Fujitsu and that secured the trade name in the US. Apple lists it as registered trademark here. The iPad trademark wasn't secured in China until Apple settled in court in November 2012. So with Apple now owning the "iPad" trademark in China and the US, why is USPTO's Examining Attorney Lee-Anne Berns now refusing Apple's "iPad mini" trademark application? One given reason is that identities such as IP Application Development and Marc Angell have applied for the "iPad" trademark in 2010 under applications 77923051 and 77913563 respectively and therefore there's a "likelihood of confusion between these marks." Why would there be any confusion when Apple owns the iPad trademark and the associated product just happens to be the bestselling tablet computer on the planet? Secondly, Apple commonly provides USPTO with their appropriate product website pages as a specimen. It's never been refused until now. This aggressive examiner is claiming that the specimen for the "iPad Mini" shown here, isn't valid. Our report presents you with the full UPSTO accounting for the refusal of the iPad mini trademark so that you can view and judge it for yourself.

On March 28, 2013, the US Patent & Trademark Office published two camera related patent applications from Apple. The first one is titled "Dynamic Autofocus Operations," which generally relates to the field of digital camera processing. More particularly, it relates to techniques for improved autofocus operations in camera found in Apple's iDevices. Apple's second invention titled "Partially Lit Sensor" relates to a new image sensing system.

On March 28, 2013, the US Patent & Trademark Office published a patent application from Apple that reveals another waterproofing idea for small portable devices. Apple has shown to have been working on a waterproof, or at the very least, a water resistant solution for over a year now. We covered this subject in a well-documented report last March. Today a new patent application illustrates that they're also working on a different angle to creating water resistant devices using a multi-layered ceramic enclosure mixed with Alumina to provide the enclosure with a good RF transmission capability. Our report also touches on another interesting process that Apple is working on called a "Shot Peening, Shot Blasting Process" for creating part flatness.

On March 28, 2013, the US Patent & Trademark Office published a patent application from Apple that reveals an invention that generally relates to a haptics device and, more particularly, to magnetically permeable materials in haptic devices. The new haptics for iDevices and the MacBook will provide crisper sensations while avoiding over sharp feedback.

On March 28, 2013, the US Patent & Trademark Office published a patent application from Apple that reveals new graphical user interfaces related to facilitating interactions with contacts. The newly proposed "contacts" GUI is designed for Macs, iDevices and a possible future TV. With the new contacts user interface, a user will be able to transfer a file to a contact by simply dragging and dropping a file icon onto a visual representation for a recipient contact. The communication mode for the transfer can be determined manually by the user or automatically based on the contact's current online status.

On March 28, 2013, the US Patent & Trademark Office published a patent application from Apple that reveals that Jony Ive and his team have a few more features for their Smart Cover. In August 2012 Apple revealed a mind boggling set of new possible features for the Smart Cover that ranged from inductive charging to built-in solar panels and the use of a flexible display to name a few of innovations being explored. Today's revelations are a little tamer but still interesting. Apple is considering adding physical soft buttons to the Smart Cover so that you could easily control your tunes. They're also considering a built-in window so that you could keep tabs on incoming email, text messages, stock quotes and more.

On March 27, 2013, US Patent & Trademark Office published a patent application from Apple that reveals a stunning future iPhone with a wraparound display so that both sides of this iPhone will be able to display content either individually or as one continuous display. The wraparound display will also apply to Apple's possible future wristband communication device or iWatch revealed in February. Today's invention focuses on the flexible wraparound display that could be fashioned in aluminum, aluminum and glass or a fully transparent design. This future iPhone design won't have any physical buttons so controlling the audio on the iPhone will simply require you to hover your hand over the side of the display to temporarily illustrate the controls. The new design could also produce 3D visuals through its unique dual display design. This is certainly one of Apple's hottest inventions of the year.

Yesterday the Korean press confirmed that Samsung has chosen games as one of its lethal weapons to beachhead into the territories of Apple and Google. Samsung is bombarding game developers with money to create a Tizen OS ecosystem. According to Korean sources, Samsung is bent on having the top 100 iPhone and Android games ready for their Tizen OS by June. While that's mildly interesting, we see that Samsung's latest announcement as being far more aggressive. Today Samsung has introduced their version of Apple's iTunes Store.

According to a new report this morning, Apple is reportedly continuing to develop a TV rumored to be called the iTV, which is likely to support Ultra HD (3840 by 2160) along with voice and motion control functions and Internet connectivity, according to industry supply chain sources.

On March 27, 2013, the US Patent & Trademark Office approved and published Apple's latest registered trademark for the icon related to the iOS version of iPhoto under registration number 4,309,109. Apple's version of iPhoto for iOS (iPhone and iPad) was introduced alongside the debut of the third-generation iPad in March 2012.

According to a new ABI Research Report out of London today, the number of NFC-enabled devices in use will exceed 500 million in 2014. The current advantage goes to Android devices who form the largest base that could take advantage of micro payment services due to arrive later this fall supported by AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon in the US via their joint venture called Isis. In Canada the major carriers will be supporting similar services via SecureKey and EnStream. According to the ABI report, "NFC has reached the point of no return."

Looking specifically at the results for the fourth quarter of 2012 (4Q12), combined shipments of desktop PCs, notebook PCs, tablets, and smartphones was nearly 378 million and revenues were more than $168 billion. In terms of market share, Apple significantly closed the gap with market leader Samsung in the quarter, as the combination of Apple's iPhone 5 and iPad Mini brought Apple up to 20.3% unit shipment share versus 21.2% for Samsung. On a revenue basis for the fourth quarter, Apple continued to dominate with 30.7% share versus 20.4% share for Samsung. Yes, that's the statistic that really matters, as everything else that the mainstream media is saying to prop up Samsung is just a lot of marketing noise.