Huawei’s expansion into the United States was almost a certainty until AT&T suddenly pulled out of the deal. Citing “political pressure,” AT&T called off the deal to carry the Huawei Mate 10 Pro and since then, Huawei has had little to no presence in the country. Still, that hasn’t stopped a Texas jury from finding Huawei and its U.S. subsidiary guilty of infringing upon multiple 4G LTE patents held by PanOptis. Huawei has been ordered to pay a $10.5 million fine, although the company is expected to appeal the ruling.
PanOptis filed its complaint in October of 2017, claiming that Huawei had infringed upon their patents for several years. Multiple attempts to organize a meeting with Huawei proved fruitless between 2014 and 2016. PanOptis presented Huawei with fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory (FRAND) terms to license the patents, although the company allegedly refused to respond. Each meeting was followed up by a letter with the same proposed terms. The patents the Chinese company allegedly violated were U.S. patent numbers 7,769,238; 6,604,216; 7,940,851; 8,385,284 and 8,208,569. These patents all relate to LTE technologies required for compliance with the standard. Specifically, they’re necessary for systems utilizing LTE to decode picture and audio data.
The products which have allegedly infringed upon these patents include the Nexus 6P, Mate 9, and the P8 Lite. No other devices were mentioned. Whether the company will be successful in an appeal is unknown, though if they were found guilty the first time then it may be difficult to overturn. Patent infringement cases are pretty black and white, though whether this case fits the mold remains to be seen. The $10.5 million fine is not on the same level as the one Google has to pay in the EU, but it still stings considering the company’s sudden (and forced) exit from the U.S. market.
Source: World Intellectual Property Review Via: Android Authority
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