Remember when Steve Jobs unveiled the iPhone, and proclaimed, to much applause, that they patented the hell out of it? Well, apparently Apple likes to boast about its own patents, but when it comes to dealing with other’s they’re not so willing. That is, if you believe Nokia: the largest phone manufacturer in the world has sued Apple for patent infringement.
Nokia claims that Apple’s iPhone, all models, infringes on ten Nokia patents coveringGSM, UMTS, and wireless LAN standards. “Nokia has already successfully entered into license agreements including these patents with approximately 40 companies, including virtually all the leading mobile device vendors, allowing the industry to benefit from Nokia’s innovation,” the company writes in a press release.
“The basic principle in the mobile industry is that those companies who contribute in technology development to establish standards create intellectual property, which others then need to compensate for,” said Ilkka Rahnasto, Vice President, Legal & Intellectual Property at Nokia, “Apple is also expected to follow this principle. By refusing to agree appropriate terms for Nokia’s intellectual property, Apple is attempting to get a free ride on the back of Nokia’s innovation.”
The company claims it has invested nearly 40 billion USD in research and development over the past two decades, which resulted in about 10000 patent families. The press release reads as if Nokia tried to enter into a patent agreement with Apple – like it did with those other 40 companies – but that Apple refused.
I’m not a particular fan of patent lawsuits, but this does kind of feel like what goes around comes around. Apple shouted its iPhone patent portfolio off the rooftops a few times (during launch, when the Pre came out), so it’s kind of hypocritical not to pay up for other companies’ patents.
But we’re getting ahead of ourselves. The lawsuit is filed in the state of Delaware, and of course hasn’t started yet. We’ll see whether there’s any merit to Nokia’s claims. It of course reeks a bit of “if you can’t beat them, sue them”, too.
What kind of patents are these? If they are sensible hardware-based patents for non-obvious inventions created by Nokia, then this is a reasonable action. I think it is right that physical inventions can be patented, and if Apple ignored the patents that apply to them, well they deserve to get sued.
Of course if this basic anti-competitive patent troll behaviour then shame on Nokia. However, I feel inclined to give Nokia the benefit of the doubt at this stage, especially considering the good work they’ve been doing with LGPLing Qt and also for the upcoming N900, which looks very promising as a hackable Linux smartphone.
I think the “if you can’t beat them, sue them” line is a bit premature, we’ll have to see whether or not Nokia can beat them with the aforementioned N900 and whatever Maemo 6 devices may manifest in 2010. By this time next year I think we’ll be in a better position to judge this.
I recall hearing that Nokia posted a loss for last quarter, could this action be driven by shareholder pressure based on this bad performance?
Actually,is pretty hard to build a phone and not infringe one of Nokia’s patents
At this point, if your child puts 2 tinker-toys together, or stacks 1 block on top of another, you are probably looking at patent violation. Best to settle up at birth.
Exactly! Mod up
Oh yeah, well I would definitely agree that there are some massive problems with the patent system as it stands. Even many present-day inventors (Trevor Baylis, James Dyson) say they dislike it, because it favours the large corporations. However, I do support the idea of patents for genuinely good inventions and I just think that the system needs to be fixed to better filter out laughable “inventions” of the 1-click calibre and to make it cheaper and easier for small businesses and individual inventors to file patents in a way that allows them to compete with the big boys.
Having said all of this, just because Nokia is taking someone to court over some patents it doesn’t necessarily mean that those patents are stupid. Nokia does spend a lot of money on research and maybe they did come up with some great ideas, on which they deserve a bit of limited-time protection! Also they’re not just attacking some small-time guys, they’re going after Apple, who could certainly afford to licence patents if everyone else can. Anyway, it’s not as if Apple doesn’t benefit from IP laws themselves.
Has there ever been any version of any patent system that didn’t benefit the already wealthy? I think the problem with patents is they seem like a good idea in the abstract. After centuries of trying that system out, when do we get to admit patents don’t benefit individual innovators?
I feel inclined to give Nokia the benefit of the doubt at this stage
That’s because you use double standars.
Edited 2009-10-22 16:08 UTC
Do not feed the troll!
Do not say: Do not feed the troll!
I’m waiting to see if the details of the contract negociations ever come out.
Having been in a situation where I was part of proposed licending deal with a patentee and just before we signed up we found out that the other company had done deals at a much lower price with other companies. When we tried to re-negociate the deal we were met with the words
“Sign the deal or we will sue for patent violation”
This is (IMHO) a great way to screw any possible competitor.
Obviously, I have no evidence in this case and there is a long way to go but as with every story, there are at least two sides to it.
Last time I checked, current worldwide patent system does not force the patent holders to license their inventions. No does it force to treat everyone the same and sell licenses at the same price. Only standards bodies require the public and non-exclusive licensing of patents.
Its probably not basic anti-competitive behavior, they have funded chip and software development, that benefit the competition as well.
They have been in talks for a long time, and Ericsson has an agreement with Apple. This is probably a way to get talks to go somewhere.
Well Nokia’s 3Q loss is just a one time “cost” do to write downs in Nokia Siemens Networks, and Navteq.
Its not a cash flow and only implication to the shareholders are cashdividend, not a bid deal as most of Nokias “dividends” are in the form of stock repurchase.
Devices made pretty good profit and did even better then estimations in some areas. So it seems that the market has reach the bottom and should start to grow again, and under 3Q their has been component shortages in the industry.
It looks to me that Nokia has a case here. But then again, when you fail to deliver what people want,you then sue.
Edited 2009-10-22 15:57 UTC
N900 is on schedual and looks great. Has Nokia failed some other delivery? Also, Nokia is working very openly with third party developers to the point that Maemo 5 is supposed to be all open; no more closed NIC binary like Maemo 4. I think the difference between the two companies along with the difference between a real patent “firm” and Nokia should be more obvious.
Besides what tabbots said to you, I’m also having a hard time figuring out how one who has failed ‘to deliver what people want’ could end up being the world’s largest cellphone maker, but whatever…
HaHa!
Are the iPhone killers like all the Android phones and the Pre using any of Apple’s patents?
Can Apple choose not to license it to HTC or Palm?
Is Apple just waiting for them to make money before they Sue?
Bunch of garbage. We’d have a cure for AIDs or Cancer by now if there weren’t patents.
Don’t be an idiot. We’d likely be a decade behind our current standpoint because big companies would have much less motivation to pour money into R&D if they can’t have some protection of their ideas.
You think the people doing the hard research work should be screwed over by some guy that just copies them when they’re done and can sell the same product for less money because they have no costs to recoup?
Yes lots of patents are stupid because they’re obvious, but the general idea of patents is excellent. It allows companies to do research and further public knowledge without sacrificing their livelihood.
So … for everything to stay as it is, we better not touch anything? It sure looks like it works for you.
Protection from whom? Do big companies really need protection? It’s the little companies and individuals that need protection, but they can’t afford it.
Big companies don’t need protection, they need money. And innovation = money on the long term. Big companies should think for the long term. No R&D budget – slow and painful death.
FYI. Disregard of copyright and patents allowed US to catch up with Europe in the 19th century. So it’s a double edged sword.
Beware of the patent troll Nokia, they could even sue OpenMoko, oh, but none of you will dare to lift a finger, because all you hypocryts see Nokia as one of the white knights who will boost open source, yep at why price?
Edited 2009-10-22 16:10 UTC
Actually, it’s likely not a case of “if you can’t beat ’em, sue ’em”, because Nokia’s overall phone sales dwarfs those of Apple iPhones:
http://www.joewilcox.com/2009/09/nokia-and-the-iphone-hype-problem/
“But Apple has a long ways to go. In second quarter, according to Gartner, Nokia sold more than three times as many smartphones as Apple and, overall, 20 times more handsets. Put differently: Nokia sold more smartphones than the next four marketshare leaders combined.”
Yes, it’s a blog, from an MS guy. But he brings up real sales figures from Gartner. In short, Nokia sells waaaaaaaay more smart phones, and waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay more handsets overall, than Apple does.
And with Apple chest beating about their own iPhone patents, all I can say to them about Nokia’s patent lawsuit against them is:
“neener neener neener!!!” 😉
In other words, you do aprove Nokia’s patent behavior this time?
There are more colors than white and black.
That’s not an answer, do you?
Do I?
You do.
Then why not add some color to your avatar?
Because of patents on colorized avatars of course!
Hey, just because osnews is willing to risk it, doesn’t mean the rest of us should.
🙂
In general, I think patents are total and complete BS, and many times people are trolling.
But in this case, Nokia did invest billions in R&D, and has legitimately licensed their patents to other handset manufacturers, and it appears these patents are actually tied to physical devices. It’s not like it’s patents on “clicking” or bubble-sort, or something ridiculous like that.
And the fact that Apple was shouting about their own patents … well, what comes around goes around.
And if every other player in this market has licensed the Nokia patents, Apple should to.
But all that said, the entire patent system needs a complete overhaul, if not obliterated entirely.
So, according you, if company “X” has invested a lot of money and time in an “X” innovation, and many others are copying it, the company has the right to sue them?
Yes, I support that statement.
Oh dear Lord, could you be any more transparent? The universe doesn’t revolve around Apple, you know.
Sure, it’s their property and who ever want’s to use it can license it. Nokia has around 45000 patent and add around 1000 more every year (hardware patent). Newcomers like RIM and Huawei has agreements with Nokia and NSN (Huawei).
Nokia ownership of IPR of 3 main stadards:
GSM 45%
UMTS (also known as WCDMA) 30%
CDMA2000 13%
Situational ethics.
Well, lets change the words Nokia for Microsoft and Apple for Linux, and instead of phones lets use operating systems, all in your own sentence and read it again just to hear how that sounds.
Edited 2009-10-22 18:35 UTC
I still support it. If Microsoft has invested money into research and has patented it, any infringements of that patent should be punished in some form, or they can license it like everyone else.
Don’t feed the troll!
Yeah, lets play the “lah lah lah Nokia ain’t doing anything wrong lah lah lah” song.
Edited 2009-10-22 16:34 UTC
Everyone is doing it wrong, but then it is how it is. If the US patent system allows this kind of exploiting, why can only the US based corporations sue at their will and not Europe based ones?
So, according you, ain’t MS fault eather is US patents systems fault?
It is pretty clear the US patent system is at fault allowing anyone unrestricted patenting on anything. Who but them should be liable instead?
In other words, MS will always be the exception to the rule, right?
I don’t follow. It’s not MS fault that the system doesn’t work. They are guilty of many other things, pick the one you like most.
It does seem like the patent office accepts just about anything.
Last time I checked, Nokia was from Europe.
Exactly. Re read what I said.
I’m ok with Nokia doing this to Apple, hopefully they’re doing it for the right reasons. My guess/hope is they’d like to use some of Apple’s patents, but Apple is refusing while still infringing on Nokia’s patents.
Anyway, patents are just plain stupid. Let’s think this through… are patents ever good for consumers? Not really. Even a rabid free market fan can admit that a patent is an artificial monopoly.
The only benefit of a patent to the public is that the process is fully disclosed so it can be improved upon. For that reason, a patent is only useful if it can’t be reverse engineered easily. Kind of hard to have a public standard if only one company makes it (esp. with wireless comm, where there are devices from many different companies that interact).
So if it isn’t good for consumers, and isn’t even based on free market principles (which, to be clear, I don’t have much faith in anyway), why does anyone want patents, other than self-serving lobbyists for companies that want an artificial monopoly?
Actually, patents do have an intended purpose in a capitalistic society. If you spend 10,000 hours in your garage, and spend $10,000,000, and marvelously discover the magic “energy for cheap” device, the patent system affords you a time-limited monopoly to recoup your investment. The intention is to foster innovation, since if there were no patent system, your invention could be quickly copied and you would be out of luck (and probably money).
So what’s the problem? Put simply, patents aren’t meant to cover “stupid” stuff – i.e., the obvious stuff, such as dragging a mouse down to select items in a list (an IBM patent). Unfortunately, this is becoming increasingly difficult to define. Is a network protocol patentable? How about a file format?
Most people agree that software patents are foolish, but common sense does not always prevail. Even when software patents are eliminated (which I predict will happen), that may not help in the case of phones. There is a lot of hardware, electricity, brodcasting, etc. going on. Patent landmines are everywhere.
So what is the real solution to the patent problem? There problably isn’t one. Instead, hopefully there will be more common sense allowed, and things like software patents, business process patents, and many obvious hardware patents will go away. But as long as a society is based on captialism, this problem will remain in some form. The current balance highly favors squashing innovation, which defeats the original intent. Only a strong injection of common sense can swing the balance back to fostering innovation. Unfortunately, common sense is not common, and it is often not lawful.
Fair enough. I will say this: I would readily vote for no patent system if the other choice were what we have now. I’m not sure where I would fall in between, except that I think patents should be much more difficult to attain.
Another thing: I agree that software patents shouldn’t exist, but that contradicts what we’ve both agreed to: That patents may be a good thing and may actually encourage innovation. Why wouldn’t we want software innovation?
Would you vote for the current patent system, no patent system, or do you think it would be possible/worthwhile to come up with something in between?
1. Software is already protected by copyright, so unlike most other types of patents, it’s already protected.
2. We always hear about software patents for stupid stuff. We rarely hear about software patents for stuff that it actually makes any sense to patent.
So, maybe there’s some software that it would make sense to patent (like whatever Google’s search algorithm is), but most software patents are definitely stupid, obvious, and totally ridiculous. And the few that aren’t are already covered by copyright, so can’t just copy what they’ve done anyway.
It seems to me that the two best things that could be done to the patent system are to make it so that stuff has to be really non-obvious and innovative in order to be patented and to make it so that patents last a much shorter period of time. I don’t care about what someone patented back in 1995. They’ve had plenty of time to recoup their costs by now. It’s ludicrous for them to sue over it now – especially when it’s some stupid, obvious idea that they came up with and didn’t even implement.
Actually, the number one thing to do to improve patents is to make it illegal for a lawyer to be involved in the writing of a patent. Look at what happens right now: an engineer writes up a patent, which is then sent to a team of lawyers who immediately translate it into “legaleze” so that it’s nearly impossible to read, and made as vague as possible at the same time. The vast majority of patents today are worthless because they don’t contain enough info to reproduce the patented “invention” so as to be vague enough to cover anything appearing in the future. What little info there is also requires a legal dictionary or lawyer to figure out what it’s saying.
In other words, lawyers have taken over the patent office to turn it into work for lawyers. It should be a felony on the same order as fraud for lawyers to be involved in anything other than a trial for patent infringement. Do that and I’ll that the patent “industry” the way it is.
I see a few reasons for software.
First, it’s easy to create and duplicate. Hardware is going to take much more expense, time and a fabrication setup of some sort. Creating a second chunk of hardware is going to take less research but will still take supplies and that expensive fabrication step.
Second, it’s already protected by copyright. The addition of patent law and intentionally confusion of patents and copyright law known as IP seems more detrimental.
Software is also simply a math formula. Math can’t be patented why can software?
Software is also business process in an applicable format. Business processes can’t be patented yet software can.
Software is also based on the programming language or, if you want to go deep enough, the command set in the processor. Prior art should negate software patents since software is based on the processor command set or programming language layers.
I can understand the value in a patent granted to a hardware process truly innovative and expensive to develop. A patent governing the display of program start commands as “icons”.. utter crap only of value to stifle competition.
I know a fool who lived in a cave for 40 years and invented a fusion engine. I’ve bought the rights to his invention, pattented it, and for the next X years my family will collect taxes for this pattent from every human being on earth.
What do you think of pattents now, because this is how it really works?
There where noises made a few years ago about clarifying and aggressively enforcing obviousness tests. Even now, in theory, a patent can be rejected for being “obvious to someone with mean skill in the art” (if I have the wording right). Problem is, for whatever reason, patent examiners basically haven’t actually been applying that standard. Whatever happened to fixing that, I don’t know.
Edit:
A patent can also be rejected if it merely combines two already-well-known elements with no novel outcomes, or if the patent covers something that is necessary to entering into a market — like if the internal combustion engine where patented, no-one could make cars. Again, examiners don’t enforce these standards, and I don’t know what happened to the effort to, well, start actually using them.
Edited 2009-10-22 21:36 UTC
Patents are actually quite beneficial on a lot of things, but abstract patents are the problem. Patents allow you to disclose your invention’s details and not loose your benefits from selling it. In other words, patents have the scientific sharing at the heart.
Nokia are correct in protecting themselves but are they doing it because Motorola, Sony/Ericsson, Samsung, LG, and other makers have already agreed or are they doing it because they fear for their future smart phone business?
If they’re trying to protect future business, think that they might do things in other areas and retaliate later. It almost seems like Microsoft and the FAT file system.
Irony or not, I think anyone being sued for such a reason should be acquitted.
Edited 2009-10-22 16:38 UTC
So, according you, patents are usefull after all, right?
To a point, they are. That’s not to say that there aren’t people with patents on a toilet paper holder and that said patents aren’t worth a crap.
Patents were supposed to protect invention and the rules haven’t been revised (much) since the early days. Copyright is also helpful, but many people consider copyright to be useless and tread over it without thought, taking what they desire.
If an individual creates something useful, shouldn’t that person benefit from it? Shouldn’t we be allowed to live well (because of our ideas) as long as we’re not hurting other people?
Well you are totally wrong. Firstly whole GSM and WCDMA are standards that has hundreds of IPs stack together by several companies. Nokia licenses stuff from Qualcomm, Ericsson and Motorola. This cross patent deal has been main reason for standard to be succesful, everyone has something in it. Nokia had long time trouble entering US markets due patent problem they had with Qualcomm, this was sorted dual licensing system that allowed Nokia use Qualcomms patents and vice versa. This benefits both companies and makes it less probaply that they use different technology to compete. None of these standards would exists if these major players didn’t make compromises and spend huge amounts of money on studying stuff. This isn’t software patent style bullshit, instead they are many years of true research done by companies and universities funded by big companies like Nokia. Most people aren’t aware that major funding for university research comes from major companies, MIT wouldn’t excists without it.
The great hero and lover of open source at work.
Promoting open source software with the other hand, while lobbying patents in the EU and suing over patents in the US with the other hand.
Kind of mixed feelings. Maybe things like these will cast a shadow also over N900/Maemo.
Edited 2009-10-22 16:52 UTC
Yeah thinking of that too. Posted on Slash first cause I saw it there first, but would probably get a better response to my questions here.
I wonder how many of those same patents are included in the Linux based Maemo OS that the N900 has.
What exactly does that mean? If you have patents on some technology, but then release a device that implements them with code that’s GPL V2 licensed? Does it mean that anyone can now use those patents royalty free as long as they use the gpl’d code? Or does it somehow invalidate them? Would GPL V3 change the situation appreciably?
From what limited information I’ve seen, this seems to be over hardware patents. The software installed on the device is less relevant.
True, so projects like openhardware and OpenMoko are affected.
Have those two projects been named in the suite? Perhaps we should wait and see what happens before jumping to conclusions.
For the GPL version 3, anyone who receives a covered work also automatically receives a license to any patentable components of that work (this is section 11 of the GPL V3: http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html ).
The GPL V2 doesn’t appear to actually have anything to say about patents, beyond this little chunk in the preamble:
Check http://www.gnu.org/licenses/old-licenses/gpl-2.0.html A quick search didn’t turn up the word “patent” anywhere else save section 8, which explicitly does not invalidate one’s patent claims.
So, if Qt is distributed under the GPL V2 (it’s LGPL, isn’t it? As far as patents are concerned, I think they’re the same thing), then being a Qt user would not automatically grant you a patent license. If it where distributed under GPL V3, it would.
Edited 2009-10-22 21:50 UTC
Qt is offered under *both* the LGPL 2.1, and the GPL 3 (along with commercial option).
At least with Nokia, their patents are in use withing almost their entire product line, and they sell ’em by the boat load.
So it’s not trolling, not in the sense that their are patent holding firms, that do nothing but file patents, produce zero products, then promptly sue anyone who actually does produce something that even remotely resembles the patents.
That kind of business needs to be eradicated entirely, as in made completely illegal, with very stiff fines and jail sentences.
So, if they sue the OpenMoko project some day, will Nokia be excused also?
Should then an opensource manufacturer/designer of duplicates of Ferrari cars be excused from patent and design claims from Ferrari?
I am against software patents. Software has copyright. Yet actual physical inventions have only patents.
As a software developer with some experience in electronics, I can say that writing software is very lite work compared to actual design and implementation of a hardware device.
Edited 2009-10-24 22:24 UTC
If the iPhone is using pre-existing chipsets that deliver this functionality, or even chipsets designed and manufactured by other companies specifically for Apple, wouldn’t the patent compliance fall to the manufacturers of the specific chipsets, or does Nokia get to collect from both of them? If we’re talking hardware patents that is…
I think this is a typical case of a software company entering the hardware market. I think although software companies do patent a lot of stuff and make a lot of noise about their patents you usually don’t see them actually suing each other very often. This is IMO because a lot of their software patents are actually very insubstantial and it is quite easy to find prior art. Furthermore because all the big software companies have a lot of patents all sufficiently broad, if one sues the other they would find violating patents left and right.
Now I have a bit the impression Apple is entering the hardware market expecting things to be done similarly there. However in the hardware business, these things are done quite different. Hardware companies are suing each other quite often, and certain fields are covered by cross-licensing schemes. In particular in fields where there companies work together on certain standards, usually all these companies try to push parts into the standard which they have patented. It usually ends up with all the companies part of the standard to have cross-licensing deals with each other (the whole x86 business is another example). Now if a new player wants to play he has to pay up to the established players first. This is I think what’s happening here, I don’t quite understand how apple thought they could get away with not agreeing to licensing. Especially if Nokia also licensed to a lot of other companies, these companies would probably not renew these agreements if they found out that Apple got away with not paying up.
That is not to say Nokia is a good guy. They have been quite active in lobbying for software patents in Europe. I actually don’t understand why, because they are to a large degree a hardware company and allowing software patents would suddenly allow software companies to enter some of their markets on a level playing field thinking they are protected by their software patents (which are a lot easier to get), exactly what Apple is trying to do.
I do think it’s unfair to say they are acting as a patent troll. They are essentially leveraging their position as one of the established players, something which the patent system was designed to do. I can’t really feel sorry for Apple either considering how vocal they are about their patents, and I believe most of it is actually hot air, considering how unsubstantial software patents are (patenting the trash icon??!! Yes Apple has a patent on the desktop trash can).
Well could you stop your stupidness, I mean did you ever hear so far that Apple sued Palm or Google for what they have done for the Pre and Android respectively? I don’t think so, right? But in the same time, Palm and Google have largely used patented ideas from the iPhone.
Instead of getting things wrong every time you write something, get your facts right. What you should say is that Nokia is a loser on the smartphone market, they don’t have the technology, they sell third class products, and they failed in everything where Apple succeeded.
I mean look at it, Apple succeeded to sell a smartphone by millions, Nokia never could; Apple invented a technologically attractive devise, Nokia never could; Apple pionnered multi touch technology on a mobile, Nokia never could; Apple developed a successful market for mobile applications that users actually use, Nokia never could besides having got viruses and malwares spreading on Symbian; Apple is successful in Japan, Nokia never did anything there besides showing how crappy Nokia phones were compared to japanese phones.
And here we are now, Nokia suing Apple because it can’t compete in technology and innovation. This is what you should notice in this story not bitching BS over Apple.
Nokia is becoming irrelevant in the smartphone market, where money can be done. The last quarter Nokia has a net loss of more than 800 millions dollars, that means they are losing money in a big way. So what to do better to get some money than to sue the company that makes the iPhone, so that Nokia can show that it still exist trying to make people believe that somehow the iPhone was possible because of Nokia?
Before Apple introduced the iPhone 3GS, it represents 32% of the smartphone industry operating profits in 1H09 with one phone, higher than what Nokia could achieve with a ton of different models, crappy phones with low margins.
http://digitaldaily.allthingsd.com/20090804/iphone-claims-32-percen…
Recently it has been estimated that the average selling price for an iPhone last quarter was $612. Nokia’s average selling price per handset last quarter was about $93.
http://aaplmodel.blogspot.com/2009/10/fiscal-4q-09-actual-results-v…
Make the math, Nokia is doomed. They are not making money. Again what to do then? Well sue the competitor responsible of that….
And if you would have made some research, you would have discovered that Nokia was sued by Qualcomm. Qualcomm has filled 11 patent infringement lawsuits against Nokia between 2005 and 2007 that related to the technology used to access 3G wireless networks.
The suit notably alleged that Nokia’s GSM/GPRS/EDGE cellular phones infringe on two patents covering the uses of speech encoders. Another Qualcomm lawsuit filed in the Eastern District of Texas, Marshall Division (a.k.a., the rocket docket) accuses Nokia of infringing on two additional patents covering the downloading of digital content over a GPRS/EDGE network. The case was eventually settled when the two companies made a cross-licensing agreement that also included transfer of several patents to Qualcomm as well as continuing royalty payments by Nokia.
But the real important thing is how Nokia reacted to that. Nokia has criticized very much Qualcomm for doing such action, stating that the dispute could impact the 3G technology as a whole and that the technology evolution could suffer as a consequence. Nokia even filed complaints with German, French, Italian, and UK regulatory authorities. Those complaints accused Qualcomm of harming competition in the cellular phone market with excessive patent licensing fees and seek to have Qualcomm barred from enforcing its patents.
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2007/05/nokia-phones-could-…
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2007/05/nokia-qualcomm-pate…
Yes this was back to 2007, only two years ago!! And now, having played the victim against Qualcomm, Nokia is suing Apple for the very same reasons. Come on, this is hypocrisy.
And attacking Apple on that is more than a stupid move. We all know that Nokia wants to sell multi-touch phones and doing that will force them to ripp off Apple’s idea as Google and Palm did. If They want a multi-touch phone which gonna have a chance on the market, they will have to step on Apple’s patents on the matter. That means if Nokia is attacking Apple now (assuming that Nokia’s claims are valid), Apple will attack them for anything they will try to do with a multi-touch devise. Actually, Apple can probably already attack them on some patent infringements.
This is what you should have commented with a little bit of research and less hypocrisy yourself, Holwerda, not always bashing on Apple for every story where the name Apple appears.
I don’t get it, what are you talking about? How does this make any sense? Apple has been designing and selling hardware for more than 30 years, come on!! This is total non-sense.
Edited 2009-10-23 06:21 UTC
As usual, you only focus on the (possibly) negative things I have to say about Apple. You conveniently ignore the last paragraph of this article, because it does not fit into your paradigm. You have been on a crusade against me for a long time, but you always conveniently ignore anything that does not reaffirm your belief that I am anti-Apple.
It’s almost religious.
For instance, you never comment on the positive articles about Apple, like, the last three we ran. You block those out, because they do not fit into your perception of me. You solve your cognitive dissonance by blocking them out.
I’m actually not even annoyed or anything by you. I feel sad for you. It must be lonely in a world where all you care about is religiously attacking anyone who dares to say even one negative iota about The One Company and Its Glorious Leader.
Edited 2009-10-23 09:40 UTC
Apples Iphone Patents are software based, while Nokias patents are hardware based.
Technology:
Nokia has patented its own multi touch technology, it is far more high tech then the one made by Apple. But thats not really important.
Nokia and Ericssons and Qualcomm are the pioneers in this field without their technology you can’t build a phone. Ericsson and Nokia has developed the wast majority of the worlds current standards and they power majority of the worlds telecommunication.
The fight between Qualcomm and Nokia is not important Nokia had to pay much higher license fees, the cross-licensing deal was a great deal for both, both had their wins and falls and they sued etch other around the world till they settled the case. Both has patents that they other one has to use so a new cross-licensing agreement had to be made.
Nokia looses some marketshare on the smarthphone market but its mostly to Samsung or LG not to Apple. But with the new N900 they will have the most innovative and powerful smartphone on the market, and their range is the largest, for keyboard bases E-series to touchscreen/keyboard based N-series and the new XpressMusic line with the X6.
To directly compare Nokia and Apples ASP is not fair, Nokia has much broader portfolio while Apple has one. If you instead compare Nokias N-series with the Iphone sales they are in the same price range and volume. Apple has also profit-sharing with the carriers that increases their earnings.
Nokias 3Q loss is entirely based on accounting principals, do to write downs in their joint-venture with Siemens and some on Navteq. They made profit, and they had positive cash flows, and the art artificial loss with only affect dividend payment.
Nokias patent claims are very real and it will take years before they reach and verdict or agreement.
If that were true, then they probably don’t have a case against Apple. Remember, there’s a little term called “patent exhaustion” that applies to hardware patents. What is it? Patent exhaustion means that if a hardware part is subject to a patent, the maker of the part pays the patent fee. The patent owner cannot charge people USING the part a patent fee as the patent was “exhausted” by the first party (the manufacturer). The only way a hardware patent could apply to Apple is if it covered the ENTIRE device in some manner, which would imply it is NOT a hardware patent.
Unless, of course, the company making the iPhone for Apple had a “cease and desist” order against them and Apple was still distributing the offending hardware (assuming Apple knew about the C&D).
From that quote, I can say that you are from the US, and don’t know anything about Nokia. You probably only read US newspapers and think the Apple has taken over the world with the iPhone.
For your information, in the rest of the world the iPhone is just another phone. The quote is totally incorrect, especially the first sentence. In the rest or your post, you are plain wrong.
The point here is that Apple hasn’t sued Palm or Google because most of Apples patents would not hold up. Apple might have been the first to have patented multitouch but it’s easy to find prior art. Furthermore patenting the individual gestures, WTF!? The IPhone patents are artificially inflated to make Apple look like a big innovator. In particular if they would start suing Palm I believe they would loose out, because Palm will hold quite a few patents they Apple would be infringing (not that I’m saying these should be any more valid then Apples).
Your point is?? Btw your Nokia is still selling multiple times as many smartphones as Apple, and lets not even talk about phones overall.
Nokias R&D budget is many times that of Apple, a large proportion of the infrastructure behind mobile phone networks runs on Nokia hardware. What is Apples great innovation on the technology side? Yes they have taken some ideas from mainly other people and build a great product out of it. Apple is a great integrator, but they do not create any “base” technology.
You’re accusing Nokia of hypocrisy but not Apple? That’s rich! I believe every large company are big on hypocrisy, they spin the news however they like. But don’t selectively accuse one.
Why do all you Apple fanboys think that Apples multi-touch patents are so valuable? The multi-touch principle has been around quite a while before Apple, Apple just brought it to the mass market. They mainly patented stuff around (like the individual gestures, which IMO is trivial to work around and also not very likely to hold up against obviousness tests). Apple does not have a very valuable or extensive patent portfolio i
Let’s see how many lawsuits SCO can handle at the same time.
Let’s face it folks everyone does wrong. However, speaking from my experience, Apple has taken way more from the open source community than its put back in. Example you ask? Well can you spell KHTML? *Cough* webkit. Such is not the case w/ Nokia (QT anyone?). Based on this I’ve concluded that this is just their (Nokia’s) attempt at checking Apple by way of drawing the “line”. So Apple fanboys give it up…we’ll see what happens when all details come out.
Few things I have picked from people who actually know stuff:
1) Timeline: First iPhone was introduced 2007, Nokia and Apple have been talking patents for year now so it started 2008, it’s very common that newcomers pay patent fees after year or so due lenghty talks.
2) Standards: Standards are full of patented stuff from several companies that are willing to license them cheap and everyone can access them, this is main principle.
3) This can take long. Nokia and Qualcomm trial took 3 years, basicly ending on cross-license agreement. Most likely trial is about weight of Nokia patents and not about liability.
4) Money isn’t issue here. We are talking 6$ per phone license costs.
Most likely this won’t offer much drama since 40 other companies have already regonized those patents. I would guess it takes 1-2 years of trial that ends on agreement of cross-licensing and both walk away as winners.
You have completely right.
The license fee for Apples part would based on current volumes be just a few million € a year. They probably settle out of court with a cross-licensing agreement, within a year or so. AS they will need other Nokia patents to impalement HSUPA.
It won’t be anything like the Qualcomm case where two giants collied.
No the two projects weren’t mentioned. They were mentioned b/c they are just examples of these two co’s contributions back to the people.
I do agree though that we need to wait and see. It’s just my opinion though that Nokia seems justified. However b/c they’re not scheming on ways to snag students $’s (by targeting the schools thereby forcing students to drop large sums of cash on their products) or putting commercials out bashing other co’s, Nokia’s recent move to “call Apple’s bluff” is seen as greedy/unjustified.
We will see though….
Edited 2009-10-23 18:51 UTC
Its 40 billion euros in R&D, so that’s about 60 billion US dollars.
There are 3 sides to every story – my side, your side, and what really happened.
As a small business owner, I am no fan of big business, ie. Coca Cola (aka – Coca Karma), Microsoft, Apple and the like. No one, myself included ever tells the whole story. We as a society tend to not own uip to our mistakes.
As far as this story goes, he who has the best documentation wins.