Lawsuits cover patents for displays, user interfaces, software, antennas, chipsets and video coding.
Nokia Corporation on Wednesday announced that it is suing Apple Inc in German and US courts, for patent infringement, claiming the US tech giant was using Nokia technology in “many” products without paying for it.
Nokia’s lawsuits, filed in courts in Dusseldorf, Mannheim and Munich, Germany, and the US District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, cover patents for displays, user interfaces, software, antennas, chipsets and video coding.
“Since agreeing a license covering some patents from the Nokia Technologies portfolio in 2011, Apple has declined subsequent offers made by Nokia to license other of its patented inventions which are used by many of Apple’s products,” Ilkka Rahnasto, head of Nokia’s patent business, said in a statement.
“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,” the statement read.
On Tuesday, Apple had taken legal action against Acacia Research Corp and Conversant Intellectual Property Management Inc, accusing them colluding with Nokia to extract and extort exorbitant revenues unfairly from Apple.
“We’ve always been willing to pay a fair price to secure the rights of patents covering technology in our products,” Reuters quoted Apple spokes person Josh Rosenstock. “Unfortunately, Nokia has refused to license their patents on a fair basis and is now using the tactics of a patent troll to attempt to extort money from Apple by applying a royalty rate to Apple’s own inventions they had nothing to do with.”
Acacia is a publicly traded patent licensing firm based in Newport Beach, California. In September, one of its subsidiaries sued Apple for patent infringement and was awarded $22 million by a Texas jury.
Nokia was the world’s leading mobile phone makers from 1998 until 2011, but missed out on the transition to smart phones triggered by Apple’s introduction of the iPhone in 2001. The Finnish company sold its handset business to Microsoft Corp for some $7.2 billion two years ago, leaving it with its telecom network equipment business and a bulging portfolio of mobile equipment patents.