Samsung sues and asks to see Apple’s next iPhone, iPad

In an interesting battle of patents of which has always plagued the world of gadgets, Samsung’s legal team has asked Apple to hand over next-generation versions of the iPhone and iPad to make sure its own future devices will not be subjected to the same infringement claims the company currently faces as part of Apple’s lawsuit from last month.

The motion, filed on Friday with the U.S. District Court in San Jose, Calif.,  asks the court to make Apple provide samples of the “final, commercial version(s)” of the iPhone and iPad, along with whatever retail packaging those products come in. Again, these aren’t announced products, they’re named in the filing as the “iPhone 4S,” “iPhone 5,” “iPad 3,” and “third generation iPad.”

The news comes a week after Apple filed a motion to see final production samples of a number of announced, though unreleased, Samsung products, including the Galaxy Tab 10.1 and 8.9 tablets, and smartphones like the Galaxy S II, Droid Charge, and Infuse 4G. The idea behind that was to evaluate whether these devices would fall under the same intellectual-property infringement claims Apple had already placed on Samsung devices like the Nexus S, Captivate, Continuum, and Mesmerize in its original court filing.

This could be one of the biggest digital battle-royale of 2011. Lets keep watching to see how this plays out.

However, if Samsung’s request is granted by the court, how do you thing this would affect Apple’s ‘element of surprise’ of which has been their biggest strength when introducing new products.