The rollout of two flagship HTC smartphones has been delayed thanks to a patent battle with Apple.
As reported by Reuters, the U.S. availability of the HTC One X and the HTC EVO 4G LTE will be pushed back until U.S. Customs officials can verify that HTC has removed an infringing piece of software from the devices.
HTC's press team is located on the West Coast and did not immediately respond to a request for comment, but in a statement provided to Reuters, a spokesman confirmed that the smartphones' arrival in the U.S. has been delayed "due to a standard U.S. Customs review of shipments that is required."
At issue is a December ruling from the International Trade Commission (ITC), which found that HTC smartphones infringed on a "data tapping" patent held by Apple. One example of this technology is a phone number within an email that you can tap to bring up the phone dialer and place a call automatically.
As a result, the ITC ordered an import ban on certain HTC devices starting April 19, 2012.
Initially, HTC said it would remove the data-tapping functionality from its phones altogether to avoid a ban. But in February, HTC announced a workaround whereby it would bypass the patent restriction while leaving the core functionality intact.
At this point, U.S. Customs must verify that the workaround has been put in place. If not, the phones will not be allowed in the U.S.
When asked if this meant that Customs will have to open and test every single smartphone imported into the U.S., patent blogger Florian Mueller said that while he is not well-versed in exactly how the procedure works, "they definitely don't have to open each and every box."
"One thing HTC might do is slightly modify the names, such as by appending the letter 'B' to all product names, in order to distinguish modified (non-infringing) products from others," Mueller said in an email.
According to Reuters, inspections have been going on for a month.
Why these particular smartphones? Mueller speculated that they are probably "the first HTC devices to be launched in the U.S. after the import ban took effect."
The HTC One X made its debut in the U.S. on AT&T on May 6. It's currently listed as out of stock on the carrier's website. The HTC EVO 4G LTE was scheduled to arrive on Sprint on May 18, but that has now been pushed back, Reuters said. A Sprint spokeswoman referred all questions to HTC.
For more, see PCMag's full reviews of the HTC One X and the slideshow below, as well as our unboxing of the HTC EVO 4G LTE.
For more from Chloe, follow her on Twitter @ChloeAlbanesius.
