Nokia announced on Wednesday that it has filed a number of complaints against Apple in Germany and the United States, alleging that its products infringe on Nokia patents. The company says it reached the decision to take action after several years of trying to reach an agreement with Apple to cover the use of its intellectual property.
“Through our sustained investment in research and development, Nokia has created or contributed to many of the fundamental technologies used in today’s mobile devices, including Apple products. After several years of negotiations trying to reach agreement to cover Apple’s use of these patents, we are now taking action to defend our rights.”
These actions have been filed with the Regional Courts in Dusseldorf, Mannheim and Munich in Germany and the US District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, with 32 patents in suit across all of the actions, covering technologies such as display, user interface, software, antenna, chipsets and video coding. Nokia is in the process of filing further actions in other jurisdictions.”
Nokia was once a dominant cellphone-maker, but was upended during the iPhone-Android smartphone revolution. It got out of the business for a while after selling its handset division to Microsoft, but it’s vowed to return in 2017 with new devices. It also co-owns NSN with Siemens and Alcatel Lucent, as well as their large patent portfolios.
Apple and Nokia have been entangled in patent battles before, but given Nokia’s deal with Microsoft and its lengthy hiatus from the handset game, the two have had little to quarrel about in recent years. They also have a licensing deal that allows Apple to use Nokia’s patented inventions in its devices, which is set to expire this year. Stay tuned.
Source: Nokia