SEP Essentials

The European Commission (“EC”) Study focused on European Courts’ “inconsistency” in the application of the Directive on the Enforcement of Intellectual Property Rights (“IPRED”) and advocated a “wait and see” “soft law” approach to solving the problem.  See, "Inconsistency" - Europe Dithers Some More ).  But, this “inconsistency” is not a failure to understand how to apply the IPRED properly but a willful refusal to follow it based on German and German-influenced Unified Pate

You can find my first post on the “Follow-up study on the application of the Directive on the Enforcement of Intellectual Property Rights” (“ EC Study ”) here: "Inconsistency" - Europe Dithers Some More .  I wanted to take another look at the EC Study since there is so much to unpack in its 132 pages (not to mention the multiple attachments).  This post focuses on patent assertion entities (PAEs) and their relationship to other identified problems.  The EC Study defines PAEs

The European Commission just released its “Follow-up study on the application of the Directive on the Enforcement of Intellectual Property Rights” (which you can find here: EC Study ) (“EC Study”).  The Directive 2004/48/EC on the enforcement of intellectual property rights (“IPRED”) “established a framework of measures, procedures, and remedies for the civil enforcement of IP rights”.    Among other reforms, it was intended to bring proportionality and balance to the conside

2026 already has been a whirlwind of global activity, including in the world of standards and standard essential patents (SEPs).  The United States has announced its intent “to win the global race for 6G” and obtain “scientific and technological global dominance” ( Global Dominance – The U.S.A.’s Views on Standards and SEPs ). China has further cemented its status as the only country in the world with a well-formulated and consistent strategy and vision around standards and S

On 27 April 2023, the European Commission published its proposal for the Regulation of Standard Essential Patents (“SEP Proposal”).  The SEP Proposal was carefully considered and vetted through the European Union’s ordinary legislative procedures.  Stakeholders and the public were given the opportunity to provide written input and there were more than 70 submissions from businesses, academics and other experts.  It was also reviewed, and comments and suggestions made, by seve

I wanted to revisit the statements made by Qualcomm and Nokia representatives at the Global Standards Leadership Conference about aggregate cellular license amounts.  See my post Global Standards Leadership Conference - Part 3 ( sepessentials.com )  for additional details on what was said during the panel.  To set the stage, according to a report put out last year by IPLytics, one of the hosts of the conference, Qualcomm is ranked no. 2 (behind only Huawei) and Nokia no. 5 in

I have previously posted in depth on the EU’s “Proposal for a Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on standard essential patents and amending Regulation (EU) 2017/1001” (“Proposal”) and recently gave an update on the passage by the EC’s Legal Affairs Committee (“JURI”) of a modified version of the Proposal. [1]   I wanted to take a deeper dive into the modifications to the Proposal (“MP”) considered by JURI. [2] I’ll start by focusing on those aspects of

I have previously posted in depth on the EU’s “Proposal for a Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on standard essential patents and amending Regulation (EU) 2017/1001” (“Proposal”). [1]  I am pleased to report that, on Wednesday (23/1/24 since we’re being European), the EC’s Legal Affairs Committee (“JURI”) adopted a modified version of the Proposal for a Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on standard essential patents and amending

Title VI of the Proposal establishes the Center as an avenue for making (potentially global) FRAND determinations. As the Proposal recognizes, we currently have at least two different jurisdictions (the U.K. and China), each of which claim to have the authority to set global FRAND rates and determine world-wide FRAND licenses. You have to ask yourself, do we need yet another forum that purports to have the authority to set global FRAND rates. The answer is yes, maybe, in so

FRAND means Fair, Reasonable and Non-Discriminatory. While the Proposal improves transparency regarding SEPs, it has some significant flaws when it comes to ensuring a fair and non-discriminatory system. This post focuses on the provisions regarding setting an aggregate royalty with a brief discussion of non-discrimination which is barely mentioned in the Proposal. There are four provisions in the Proposal that address the setting of an aggregate royalty (Articles 15 – 18)

As I previously discussed (see EU Proposal - Part One ), the goals of the European Commission’s “Proposal for a Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on standard essential patents and amending Regulation (EU) 2017/1001” (“Proposal”) are laudable. The details of the proposal are important however, and this post takes a deeper dive into those details. If those details are done well, the final regulations could do much to accomplish its goals of bringing tra

The EU Strategy on Standardisation was updated last year “to deliver on the twin green and digital transition and support the resilience of the single market.”[1] The Strategy is mostly forward looking and includes plans for a review of “existing standards, to identify needs for revisions or development of new standards to meet the objectives of the European Green Deal and Europe’s Digital Decade and support the resilience of the single market” and to develop new standards to

The European Commission’s “Proposal for a Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on standard essential patents and amending Regulation (EU) 2017/1001” (“Proposal”) is an attempt to bring some sanity to what is now a fragmented, difficult, time consuming and expensive FRAND licensing system. In drafting my opening post, I took a walk down memory lane into the global SEP licensing disputes that surrounded the development of the third generation (3G) cellular