Nokia Claims Patent Violations in Most Apple Products

An anonymous reader writes with an extract from this Associated Press story, as carried by The Globe and Mail: "Nokia is broadening its legal fight with Apple, saying almost all of the company's products violate its patents, not just the iPhone. Nokia Corp. said Tuesday that it has filed a complaint against Apple Inc. with the US International Trade Commission. The Finnish phone maker says Apple's iPhone, iPods and computers all violate its intellectual property rights."

Comments

Software patents

[Anonymous Coward]

One of the patents that Apple is countersuing on is this one:
No. 6,239,795 B1: Pattern and color abstraction in a graphical user interface

Sounds to me like rabid software patenting.

Source- http://www.informationweek.com/blog/main/archives/2009/12/apple_nokia_sto.html

Re:how the mighty have fallen

[EvilNTUser]

Judging by market share, Nokia is number one with Symbian. Judging by operating system technology, Nokia is number one with Maemo. Who exactly do they need to catch up with and how?

Re:This is not going to end well

[Bigjeff5]

So you're saying it would be more like Nokia poking Apple with a stick, Apple getting out their Super Stick of Doom (patent pending), followed by Nokia crushing Apple with their Patent Log of All Things Terrible and Marvelous (patented)?

Re:Mutually assured destruction...

[Bigjeff5]

I imagine a patent battle playing out like one of those weird anime card battles:

Apple: I summon... Multitouchscreen patent level three!
Multitouchscreen patent level three does 50 damage!

Nokia: I summon... Wirelessaudiotransmitionoverradio patent level five!
Wirelessaudotransmitionoverradio patent level five does 120 damage!

I mean I don't know what the actual patents are, but that seems to be the way it works.

Re:This is not going to end well

[rsmith-mac]

Bear in mind why Apple hasn't licensed these patents yet. If their side of the story (and their counter-suits) are to be believed, then it's because Nokia won't license them under Reasonable And Non-Discriminatory (RAND) terms.

All indications that Apple wants to pay the same licensing fee that Sony, Motorola, etc have paid. Nokia on the other hand doesn't want the fee - they want to cross-license Apple's patents - which are far more valuable than any fee that other handset manufacturers have paid. Nokia is violating RAND by refusing to license the necessary patents to Apple as they have the other handset manufacturers. Under RAND terms, Apple is under no obligation to cross-license to get access to Nokia's patents, although they still have the option of doing so if they'd like (and here's a hint, they don't want to).

For that reason, even if Nokia has a stronger patent portfolio, it's anyone's guess how this will finally go. The larger GSM Association requires that all of this stuff be offered under RAND terms, so there may be consequences for Nokia if they keep this up.

Re:Nokia and the hurt bag...

[Bigjeff5]

I'd be very surprised if Apple were the big dog in this fight, given that Nokia has been designing and manufacturing cell phones for decades (verses just a couple years for Apple), has a very large patent portfolio in the cell phone realm on such trivial technologies as GSM and the like, and has almost 500 times the cell phone market share that Apple has.

Seriously, Nokia is not just a behemoth in the cell phone realm, it is THE behemoth. Sony-Ericsson, the next largest cell phone manufacturer, has less than 1/3 Nokia's market share.

Also, patent trolling is buying up patents and springing lawsuits on companies when one of them gains sufficient momentum. That is not what Nokia did. Nokia does original research and developement in cell phone technology, it's why they are the largest cell phone manufacturer in the world. Nokia offered licensing terms and Apple didn't like them. Just because Apple doesn't like the terms does not mean they get to ignore the patents. Apples only legal options were to accept the terms or not use the infringing technology, they did neither and now they have been sued.

Re:Consistency or hypocrisy?

[googlesmith123]

I thought those were the patents that Apple held. So these are the ones Apple is claiming Nokia infrienged. Source: http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/09/12/11/apple_files_countersuit_against_nokia.html

Wrong! Nokia wanted to extort Apple.

[motorcyclemaintain]

The issue Apple faces is that the patents Nokia were originally pursuing were patents that every single other mobile manufacturer was happy to license.

Actually no. Nokia wanted Apple to give them much more than "every other single" manufacturer. Nokia wanted to charge Apple 3x the fair and reasonable rate they charged others. They also wanted free access to Apple tech. Here are just a few of Apple's complaints:

Article 81. In Particular, in or about the spring of 2008, Nokia demanded that, as part of it’s compensation for licensing Nokia’s portfolio of purported essential patents, Apple must grant Nokia a license to a particular number of Apple non-standards-essential patents...Apple immediately rejected the proposal and reiterated Apple’s position that Nokia’s F/RAND obligations required it to licence Nokia’s purportedly essential technologies.

Article 82. ...In or about May 2009, Nokia demanded a royalty approximately three times as much as the royalty proposed the prior spring, which was itself in excess of a F/RAND rate, as well as “picks’ to Apple’s non-standards-essential patents.

Naughty Nokia. Go to your room.

Re:Wrong! Nokia wanted to extort Apple.

[sznupi]

Nokia wanted to charge Apple 3x times more only after Apple refused cross-licensing. And cross-licensing is what surely any other notable phone tech manufacturer does with Nokia.

Seems Apple is just convinced it should be the only one getting better treatment than "fair/reasonable and non-discriminatory" (as agreed by this industry). I say send the spoiled kid to his room first.

Re:Wrong! Nokia wanted to extort Apple.

[Xest]

This is merely Apple's argument, not fact.

Whether the argument is valid is down to the courts, and the GSM association to decide. Even then you may note that in those very quotes Apple themselves note that they were offered a different, much lower figure originally but still refused it citing it was excessive.

So the question for the courts/GSM association is, were the rates every really excessive, or is that just a convenient excuse that Apple has been using to try and actually pay an unreasonably low fee?

Really?

[Anonymous Coward]

So Nokia owned patents for annoying advertisements and cornering the smug douchebag market?

Re:What this is really about

[Bigjeff5]

Apple is not a GSM Association member. They had nothing to do with developing GSM, and so don't have claim to the favorable RAND terms available to GSM Association members.

If Nokia wanted more in exchange for the use of their patents than other GSM patent holders do, then that is their right. If Apple doesn't want to pay Nokia's terms, they need to find a way around the patents. If that's what they did, then Apple will win. If they didn't, well, you don't get to just say "Your patent isn't important" and ignore it.

Claiming that other Apple products violate their patents is just more posturing to try and force a settlement on terms that are very unfavorable to Apple.

That's assuming Apple products don't violate Nokia patents. If they do violate the patents, then Nokia's position is completely legitimate, and Apple refused to license Nokia's patents and went ahead and infringed them.