Back in June, a California District Court granted a preliminary injunction on sales of the Samsung Galaxy Nexus in the US. The district court ruling was in reference to Apple’s ‘604 patent, pertaining to universal search. Samsung quickly filed an appeal, contended that the relatively low sales numbers of the Galaxy Nexus would present no harm to Apple and the Court of Appeals agreed to temporarily lift the ban (reason why you don’t recall it being banned).

Now, after close examination, the Court of Appeals has decided to permanently lift the ban, stating:

“Apple has presented no evidence that directly ties consumer demand for the Galaxy Nexus to its allegedly infringing feature,” and that the California District Court “abused its discretion in entering an injunction.”

This decision is important because it essentially lets Apple know that they simply wasted their money on a legal crusade that gained them nothing. The Galaxy Nexus continues to be sold, and Android devices in general continue to be activated at a rate of over 1.3 million a day.

Granted, it has resulted in precautionary moves by certain manufacturers to remove unified search from their Android devices, however, the point remains: all those devices are selling better than expected (meaning the removal of unified search in no way helped Apple).

While we’re sure Apple doesn’t mind throwing away their money, perhaps after enough fruitless victories they will come to the conclusion that their money would be better spent on research and development.

• ViaThe Verge