The past decade has witnessed a sharp increase in litigation over standard essential patents (SEPs) around the world. National courts in several countries including UK have ruled they can set global FRAND rates, the Unwired Planet case in UK being a notable example. This approach is controversial and has sparked debates over the ability of…

I won’t go into the numerous litigations involving OPPO around the world, nor will I comment on the decisions rendered by the German Courts since this summer. What interests me is the unprecedented attitude of OPPO in these proceedings – which withdrew its products from the German market even before any injunction was enforced –,…

Recently, the decisions of courts in the United Kingdom (UK) in Unwired Planet v Huawei Technologies (Unwired Planet) and Optis Cellular Technology v Apple (which followed the decision of the UK Supreme Court in Unwired Planet) have given rise to significant debate over the appropriate forum for litigation of disputes in relation to standard essential…

In two recent decisions the District Court of The Hague assumed cross-border jurisdiction in FRAND / Standard Essential Patent (‘SEP’) proceedings. In a first case the Court assumed jurisdiction on claims related to the FRANDness of a SEPs (patent pool) license. In a second case the Court assumed jurisdiction on an anti-anti-suit injunction (‘AASI’) claim…

Recently, the UK Intellectual Property Office (UKIPO) has launched a call for views in order to better understand how effective the current Standard Essential Patents (SEPs) framework is in encouraging creativity, innovation, and promoting competition. Ultimately, the call aims to determine whether legislative changes are required. An interesting aspect of this call is that an…

The UK and US governments have recently launched calls for views regarding their SEP and FRAND policies, in order to understand the opinions of all the stakeholders, such as patent owners, implementers, consumers, etc. In the US, the Department of Justice (DoJ), the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), and the United States Patent…

This short post reports on one of the Panel Sessions at this year’s AIPPI Congress which took place virtually for the second year in a row. The tenth panel session of the AIPPI Online World Congress 2021 addressed global FRAND determinations by national courts and out-of-jurisdiction judgments in the form of anti-suit and anti-anti-suit injunctions….

Introduction The implementation of 4G mobile communication technology in the UK has become very expensive for Apple in light of the High Court of England and Wales’ decision last month in Optis v. Apple. The court held that Optis’s standard-essential patents (‘SEPs’) were infringed by Apple. The court added that it was willing to decide…

On Wednesday 16 June 2021, Mr Justice Mellor handed down his judgment in the second technical trial in the Mitsubishi & Sisvel v OnePlus & Xiaomi proceedings ([2021] EWHC 1639 (Pat)), holding that the patents in suit were valid and essential to the LTE standard. The proceedings had been brought in an attempt to persuade…