Apple Faces Ericsson Lawsuit After Refusing Licensing Deal
Apple faces further legal action from Ericsson this week after refusing to accept a licensing deal for its patented LTE technologies, according to The Wall Street Journal. The Swedish networking company on Friday said it is suing Apple for infringing 41 wireless-related patents that it believes are critical to the functionality of products such as the iPhone and iPad.
“By refusing Ericsson’s fair and reasonable licensing offer for patented technology used in Apple smartphones and tablets, Apple harms the entire market and reduces the incentive to share innovation,” the company said in a statement.
Ericsson has filed two complaints with the U.S. International Trade Commission in an effort to secure an exclusion order against Apple, which could block the iPhone, iPad and other products involved from being sold in the United States. The company has also filed seven complaints with the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas as part of the negotiations. Apple's previous licensing deal with Ericsson expired in mid-January.
Apple originally filed suit against Ericsson on January 12, arguing that it was demanding excessive royalties for patents not essential to LTE standards. Ericsson countersued in a Texas courtroom just hours later, seeking an estimated $250 million to $750 million in royalties per year for Apple to continue licensing its patented wireless technologies. Ericsson is the world's largest provider of mobile network equipment and holds over 35,000 patents related to 2G, 3G and 4G wireless technologies.
Apple was ordered to pay Smartflash LLC a $533 million settlement earlier this week in a separate patent lawsuit.
Top Stories
We've seen a lot of teasers about the Beats Studio Buds over the past month since they first showed up in Apple's beta software updates, and today they're finally official. The Beats Studio Buds are available to order today in red, white, and black ahead of a June 24 ship date, and they're priced at $149.99.
The Studio Buds are the first Beats-branded earbuds to truly compete with AirPods...
Serif today announced across-the-board updates for its popular suite of Affinity creative apps, including Affinity Photo, Affinity Designer, and the Apple award-winning Affinity Publisher for Mac, all of which were among the first professional creative suites to be optimized for Apple's new M1 chip.
"After another year which saw record numbers of people switching to Affinity, it's exciting to...
As is tradition, Apple executives Craig Federighi and Greg Joswiak joined Daring Fireball's John Gruber in an episode of The Talk Show to discuss several announcements that Apple made over this weeks WWDC, including iPadOS 15, macOS Monterey, and a large focus around privacy.
Federighi kicks off the conversation discussing the common architecture, now thanks to Apple silicon, across all of...
The upcoming 14-inch MacBook Pro is set to be more expensive than the current 13-inch MacBook Pro and both the 14 and 16-inch models will offer the same performance, according to the leaker known as "Dylandkt."
The leaker shared the information on Twitter, explaining that both of the upcoming MacBook Pro models, expected to come in 14 and 16-inch sizes, will feature the same performance due...
YouTube is planning to stop supporting its YouTube app on the third-generation Apple TV models, where YouTube has long been available as a channel option.
A 9to5Mac reader received a message about the upcoming app discontinuation, which is set to take place in March.Starting early March, the YouTube app will no longer be available on Apple TV (3rd generation). You can still watch YouTube on...
Google and the three major U.S. carriers, including Verizon, AT&T, and T-Mobile, will all support a new communications protocol on Android smartphones starting in 2022, a move that puts pressure on Apple to adopt a new cross-platform messaging standard and may present a challenge to iMessage.
Verizon recently announced that it is planning to adopt Messages by Google as its default messaging...
Google has rolled out picture-in-picture support as an "experimental" feature for YouTube premium subscribers, allowing them to watch video in a small window when the app is closed.
If you're a premium YouTube subscriber looking to try out picture-in-picture, follow these steps: Launch a web browser and sign into your YouTube account at YouTube.com.
Navigate to www.youtube.com/new.
Scroll...
The iPhone 13 will feature low earth orbit (LEO) satellite communication connectivity to allow users to make calls and send messages in areas without 4G or 5G coverage, according to the reliable analyst Ming-Chi Kuo.
In a note to investors, seen by MacRumors, Kuo explained that the iPhone 13 lineup will feature hardware that is able to connect to LEO satellites. If enabled with the relevant...
Twitter today introduced Snapchat-style QR codes, which are designed to make it easier to find and follow friends on the social network. Each Twitter QR code is unique to an individual Twitter user, so when scanned, it'll bring up the person's account.
To access your Twitter QR code, you'll need the official Twitter app for iOS. In the app, go to your profile, tap on the gear icon, and select...
Apple today seeded the sixth developer beta of macOS Monterey, the newest version of the macOS operating system. The sixth beta comes three weeks after Apple released the fifth macOS Monterey beta.
Registered developers can download the beta through the Apple Developer Center and once the appropriate profile is installed, betas will be available through the Software Update mechanism in...
Top Rated Comments
Ericsson licenced patented technology to Apple so Apple agreed to it in the past
Negotiations broke down over continued licencing
Licence expired
Apple continued to used the tech without permission
Ericsson offered to have a third party determine a fair compensation
Believing that this case has anything to do with patent trolls makes be believe that you shouldn't be commenting in this thread.
My .02.
Ericsson is a real company with employees that provides real services and products. They do not meet the definition of a patent troll.
If Apple has infringed on their patents then they have to pay royalties. Just because Apple is a big company that makes your favorite hardware and/or you own stock in doesn't justify theft of innovation.
Apple and Ericsson had a licensing agreement in place that expired. So they both acknowledged that there was a valid patent, and that it was reasonable to license said patent for usage in the devices.
Essentially, this is nothing more than a business negotiation that Ericsson has now taken to litigation. The result is that Apple is now forced to either roll the dice in a jurisdiction that is known to be unfriendly to defendants, or settle with essentially a gun to their head.
Why not create a mediation panel, tied to the USPTO that hears disputes such as this? Each side presents their case, and the panel determines questions of patent validity and value. If either of the parties is unhappy enough with their findings they can appeal the decision through the Federal appeals courts.
At least with this methodology these important decisions can be kept out of the hands of the kangaroo courts in the Eastern Division of Texas.