The decision this week, in effect, tosses a box of ammo to Apple to use against Samsung in the pair’s ongoing war over smartphone patent – a conflict that’s been raging for at least four years in other courts.

“We are fighting to defend the hard work that goes into beloved products like the iPhone, which our employees devote their lives to designing and delivering for our customers”, the company said.

The ruling could have widespread consequences in how fights are settled when it comes to complicated gadgets, and help the owner of patents to limit copying by competitors. “Apple does not seek to enjoin the sale of lifesaving drugs, but to prevent Samsung from profiting from the unauthorized use of infringing features in its cellphones and tablets”.

Samsung has indicated that it could implement technological workarounds to its phones that would enable it to avoid continued infringement on Apple’s patents. Samsung, which asked for $421 million in its countersuit, didn’t get anything. Unfortunately, Judge Lucy Koh denied the particular request.

The U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California earlier ruled Samsung had not infringed Apple’s patent intentionally. However, two law college professors say that it could have longer-term implications – allowing Apple to apply for injunctions against newer Samsung devices with similar features, and giving the company additional clout in future disputes. The patents have given it the power to Apple to protect the inventions that it developed using massive investments.

The market impact will likely be limited, since the lawsuit was filed in 2012 and covers products that came out that year, like the Galaxy S3. Judge Koh, in a pretrial judgement, had already ruled that Samsung infringed the ‘172 “automatic word correction” patent, and the jury simply calculated damages. It was a legal error for the lower court to reject evidence that unique features drive phone sales – and that infringement causes irreparable harm.

That case was decided in May 2014 when Apple was awarded $120m (£76m) damages. The court ruling will effectively block sales of the South-Korean phone maker’s older smartphone models in the USA which includes the Galaxy S3 which was released back in 2012. The court opined that it such an order was not passed, it would “eliminate” patent rights of particular features in multiple component devices to its ‘inventors’. None of those were named in the suit, however, the ruling provides Apple’s legal team with a valuable precedent. “Apple has not attempted to expand the scope of its monopoly”.

A Thursday ruling from a U.