“We don’t mind competition, but if others rip off our intellectual property, we will go after them,” said Apple executive Tim Cook about iPhone competition. A follow-up question specifically mentioned the Palm Pre by name, since the Pre has some very iPhone elements, like multitouch and touchscreen gesture technology.

SlashGear wrote:

Both the Pre and the iPhone have capacitive panels capable of recognising multiple points of contact and complex gestures; judging by the state of the technology, it’s fair to assume that today’s implementations of multitouch are simply scratching the surface of what is possible.  Palm is believed to be using a capacitive panel by Cypress Semiconductors, who boast their technology is capable of individually tracking ten touch-points; the origin of the iPhone touch panel is still unknown, although in Cypress’ video demo they do show the Apple smartphone at several points.

[via SlashGear]