A German Court Ruling May Threaten Apple Video Services

A German district court has ruled that Apple Inc.

violated patents acquired by Swiss security company Kudelski's OpenTV business, according to a report on Reuters. http://www.reuters.com/article/us-apple-germany-ruling-idUSKCN0WI32U The report said the ruling could force the iPhone maker to remove some video streaming features from popular products sold in Germany. The ruling by a three-judge panel at the Duesseldorf district court on Tuesday said that Apple must not supply software that infringes an OpenTV patent covering the mixing of video, audio and online information in a single video stream, Reuters reported. The court's decision puts pressure on Apple to seek a licensing deal from Kudelski, though Apple could comply by removing or disabling the offending features from its video streaming products. In the worst case, it would have to pull the devices from the market. Products that could be affected range from iPhones to iPad tablets, Mac computers, iTunes music service, the Quicktime video software player and Apple TV, the report said citing court documents. The report said since 2012 Kudelski has waged a high-profile campaign on intellectual property licensing, taking on some of the world's biggest technology groups in courts far and wide. It has reached settlement deals with Alphabet Inc

, Cisco Systems, Inc.

and Cisco Systems, Inc.

. Last month, Kudelski signed a multi-year patent cross licensing agreement with Verizon Communications Inc.

. Under the agreement, the parties will dismiss all pending patent litigation, which relates to Verizon's Fios television service, video advertising functionality, and OTT streaming services including AOL, Inc.

. Financial terms were not disclosed. Meanwhile, Apple released a new "Apple Events" app on the tvOS App Store for the fourth-generation Apple TV. The app will be used to live stream the Apple event set to take place on March 21 at 10:00 a.m. Pacific Time. Read more: http://www.benzinga.com/news/16/03/7729598/apple-events-launches-on-apple-tv-ahead-of-mondays-event#ixzz43HB9sjow Shares of Apple were trading at $105.80. They have dropped 1.4 percent this year.