Disputed patent issue in Germany - Prohibition on selling Lenovo laptops and smartphones
The sales ban implicates Lenovo devices featuring a WWAN module (Wireless Wide Area Network), specifically Motorola smartphones and some notebooks and tablets with mobile connectivity.
Wirtschaftswoche, a German financial magazine, reported that this restriction stemmed from a patent lawsuit filed by the American corporation Interdigital. The legal battle was heard at the Munich Regional Court (Case No. 7 O 12029/23) in early May. It was decided that Lenovo had violated Interdigital's mobile phone patents. Consequently, on May 8, the plaintiff obtained a security deposit worth over 4 million euros to enforce the verdict.
The court decree reads, "The defendants are barred from marketing infringing products in Germany… or importing them. Furthermore, they must pay damages," stated a representative from the Munich Regional Court in Wirtschaftswoche. Retailers cannot stock up on new products anymore.
Interdigital's attorney, Josh Schmidt, stated in a statement, "We hope that Lenovo will rectify its actions post the court's decision and finally comply with the requirement of granting a fair and appropriate license." Lenovo maintains that Interdigital did not offer the license under FRAND (fair, reasonable, and non-discriminatory) terms and breached the requirement to grant standard patents.
Notably, Interdigital has previously clashed with multiple multinational corporations like Samsung and Nokia in court. These disputes frequently revolved around the question of how fairly and reasonably Interdigital provides its patents.
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Source: symclub.org
