Modest SEP royalties on smartphones have declined and licensing is stabilizing

Aggregate royalty payments for licensing cellular technology standard-essential patents (SEPs) in smartphones have remained in modest single-digit percentages and have declined since 2013.

This defies purported concerns that the stacking of patent royalties paid to multiple licensors has led to or would lead to unreasonably high aggregate rates on mobile devices. It also counters the claims of some original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) and others that various SEP owners demand licensing fees in excess of what is fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory (FRAND).

The true aggregate price is fair and reasonable

Amid wild speculation about SEP licensing charges up until 2015, one article drawing a lot of attention around then outrageously asserted the cost could be 30 percent of a $400 smartphone price. In response, I set about measuring how much in patent royalties was actually being paid in comparison to total revenues generated on mobile handset sales (e.g. $410 billion in 2014, according to IDC). I termed the ratio of the two figures, expressed as a percentage, the “royalty yield.” This is an average reflecting all royalties paid divided by the total of licensed and unlicensed handset sales revenues.  I found the royalty yield to be no more than around 5 percent in aggregate including all licensors. That percentage is the sum of the royalty yields for individual licensors.

My assessments were conservatively high because some of the royalties paid are for licensing intellectual property other than cellular SEPs, or are for network equipment, devices such as PC data sticks or IoT appliances.

I found that major licensors Alcatel-Lucent, Ericsson, InterDigital, Nokia and Qualcomm accounted for most royalties paid, even with conservatively high estimates for other licensors. For example, I included 3G and 4G LTE patent pool licensing at rate card prices, even though it was evident hardly any implementers were signing up for those.

My methodology and results were replicated and validated in a couple of academic research papers, including one enduring peer review before publication, which with more detailed analysis showed aggregate yields to be even lower than my estimates.

Aggregate royalties declined despite global boom in 4G LTE smartphones and introduction of 5G

Total royalties and royalty yields have fallen substantially since 2015 for those major cellular SEP licensors. While 4G LTE smartphone sales surged, OEMs have managed to reduce royalty rates paid for licensing. For example, even though royalties are generally charged as a percentage of a phone’s selling price, royalty caps limiting the royalty charge—as if the phone price was, for example, $200 or $400—ensure that royalty yields reduce as smartphone prices are raised, for example, with introduction of new models priced at $1,000 or more in recent years.

Licensing revenues and aggregate royal yield for major mobile SEP licensors
2013-2020

Source: Company financial disclosures and WiseHarbor analysis.
Nokia completed its acquisition of Alcatel-Lucent in 2014.
Qualcomm figures include retroactive allocations of licensing dispute settlement payments of $4.7 billion by Apple in 2019 and $1.8 billion by Huawei in 2020 that were not included in Qualcomm Technology Licensing segment figures.

With the introduction of each new generation of mobile technology since 3G, it was also alleged that charges for the new standards would stack further to an unreasonable aggregate burden on OEMs and consumers. However, despite 5G’s commercial introduction in 2019, aggregate royalties have not risen for these companies that also first announced programs and charges for 5G licensing. 

Up and downs

There is was substantial increase in royalty income for Nokia from 2014. But this is unsurprising due to a dramatic change in the company’s industry profile and business model following the divestiture of its smartphone business to Microsoft that year. For Nokia prior to 2014, as for Samsung and Apple since then, SEP licensing was more oriented to minimizing—through cross-licensing—the licensing fees charged by other patent owners on market-leading handset sales, than to generating cash royalties. A question posed to me by a hedge fund client back then was: ‘to what extent and how quickly could Nokia “unroll” its cross-licenses to increase the cash royalties it receives?’ Nokia’s licensing revenues more than doubled between 2014 and 2017 before declining around 15 percent in the following years to 2020. The company’s royalty yield also doubled to 0.4 percent before falling back somewhat over the same time periods.

Though royalty fees for Ericsson, Nokia and Qualcomm are modest in comparison to revenues from all their other sales, royalties are very important because profit margins on licensing are relatively high. SEP licensing fee income is crucial to fund the substantial ongoing R&D investments by all these licensor companies, also including InterDigital. With development of further standard-essential technologies, the benefits of those investments also become openly available to the entire mobile ecosystem.

The major licensors detailed in my 2015 analysis received more than half of all royalties paid and still do despite the overall decline in licensing revenues for these companies. The aggregate royalty yield including the above-named companies and all other licensors has also declined. As other players have become more significant in licensing, these have had only minor effects on aggregate royalties paid by OEMs to all licensors. For example, while Huawei now boasts large shares of patents declared essential to LTE and 5G standards, with its smartphone market share second only to Samsung in 2019, like old Nokia, Samsung and Apple, Huawei has also been more focused on minimizing the royalties it has had to pay out than on increasing the cash royalties it generates. With cross-licensing, OEMs with SEP portfolios share their intellectual property while minimizing licensing costs on their product manufactures and sales.

With the US chip supply bans on Huawei and with it spinning off its Honor sub-brand, Huawei’s smartphone market share has plummeted and it is also now seeking to increase its patent monetization. While Huawei has reportedly paid out more than $6 billlion in patent fees over decades, it is expecting to generate between $1.2 billion and $1.3 billion in patent licensing revenues between 2019 and 2021. I presume that means revenues averaging around $420 million per year over three years. Similarly, with LG exiting the smartphone market due to its poor profitability there, despite its large mobile SEP portfolio, it could also seek to increasingly monetize its SEPs through licensing, or through patent sales.

There are other cellular SEP licensors, including some so-called patent assertion entities that have obtained headline-grabbing licensing awards. But the significance of these on aggregate royalty yields is also relatively small. Large award figures tend to cover numerous years of infringement and it can take many years of litigation with awards being amended or revoked before appeals processes are exhausted or settlement with lower amounts paid. Following the annulment of a $506 million jury verdict last year in favor of PanOptis for 4G LTE patent infringements by Apple, a recent jury retrial including directions to consider requirements for FRAND licensing terms has revised the award to $300 million. Apple says It plans to appeal.

It is OEM conduct that unlevels the playing field

Contentions about royalty charges are as much about the differences in licensing fees among licensees as they are about the level of charges overall. It is these differences that effect competition among OEMs.

The absolute costs of patent licensing fees have never had much effect on overall market demand because aggregate royalties paid by OEMs are modest in comparison to their handset prices and revenues.  While many OEMs, including larger ones like LG in recent years, struggle for profitability, it is the disparities in the amounts paid—or not paid—for licensing that can cause significant competitive disadvantage or advantage among smartphone and other device OEMs. For example, all manufacturers have to pay somewhat similar prices for commodities such as batteries and memory chips, and European value added taxes are levied at exactly the same rate on all manufacturers’ devices sold, at national rates ranging from 17 percent to 27 percent.

While the onus is upon licensees to be non-discriminatory in their licensing charges, it is OEMs implementing SEP technologies that push for the inequalities. All the major licensors publish rate cards and would willingly license to all OEMs at those prices. However, major licensees such as Apple are formidable counterparties in licensing negotiations and disputes. They have the motivation, deep pockets and clout to force burdensome and drawn-out litigation, and yet can offer enticements such as substantial cash lump sums up-front for settlement at low effective royalty rates. Other OEMs have found it advantageous to hold out from making any royalty payments for years under the rationale that litigation is cheaper, even if it only delays eventual payment of FRAND royalties.

While for many years the debate on FRAND was largely about what might be a fair and reasonable rate for individual licensors in general, and for all of them in aggregate, SEP litigation is increasing about discriminatory pricing. Unacceptable versus acceptable discrimination (i.e. differences in royalty pricing for different licensees) apparently hinges on whether different licensees are deemed “similarly situated.” It was a key question in selecting “comparable licenses” in TCL v. Ericsson, as it is in other disputes. This is still work-in-progress in the courts.

Expanding the royalty base with licensed sales in IoT

My royalty yield figures are conservative because they are based on the denominator of mobile phone sales revenues which does not includes any sales revenues from other cellular-enabled products including tablets, PC data sticks and IoT devices. The inclusion of any such revenues would reduce royalty yields further. With IoT becoming more significant in mobile communications in recent years, omitting the increasing revenues for those devices from the denominator of my royalty yield calculations makes my yield curve the above graphic an increasingly conservative depiction of how low royalty charges are.

Measuring and assessing whether royalty charges are FRAND or burdensome overall is more complex beyond phones where the royalty yield was a simple and useful metric. Other devices range from simple sensors to refrigerators, cars and industrial equipment. The prices for these and the value they derive from cellular connectivity varies enormously.

Non-phone devices are commonly licensed, but sales of these and licensing revenues on them have been relatively small. Mobile phones continue to dominate numbers of cellular devices sold and licensed, but the proportion of non-cellular devices has gradually increased. According to GSMA Intelligence, the percentage total cellular network connections that are “machine-to-machine” increased from 2.7 percent of 6.9 billion worldwide in 2013 to 17.4 percent of 10 billion in 2020.  The percentages of non-phone device sales, upon which royalties are due, would be higher in these growing markets because it is the accumulated sales of devices over several years that drive the total numbers of connections.

With the anticipated growth in IoT including 5G and applications such as connected cars, some analysts, including JP Morgan in a June 2021 equity research report, project significant non-smartphone revenues: for example; “an estimated ~$1 bn of the ~$6.5 bn of QTL revenue being derived from non-handset license royalties.”

Qualcomm Technology Licensing revenue breakdown

Increased SEP pooling makes sense, but buyers cartels are anticompetitive

I have already written here that the voluntary option of one-stop-shopping for patent licenses in IoT makes sense to minimize the transaction costs in licensing with dozens of patent owners and thousands of licensees with a wide variety of applications.

However, initiatives to form buyers’ groups (aka Licensing Negotiation Groups) that would “negotiate” royalty rates from licensors collectively and, in effect, exclusively on behalf of IoT implementers would harm the increasing stability achieved in FRAND licensing. These monopsony cartels would have dire anticompetitive effects. As noted by a couple of commentators: “while implementers should be consulted about the reasonableness of standard’s technology aggregate price, the final pricing decision should better be left to SEP owners….  Permitting companies that have not developed and do not own technology to decide on its price would effectively resemble an expropriation of technology, making SEP owners rightfully sceptical about participating in such joint negotiations.”

Even patent pools like MPEG LA’s for H.264 video SEPs—with participation from some major patent owners who are also major OEM licensees—tend to depress royalty rates significantly below what would be and is charged bilaterally. All well and good, maybe, for voluntary participants (as the law requires) with mixed business models including patent fee generation and standards-based product supply, but totally unacceptable compulsorily for licensors, or as the only way licensees would be obliged to agree to anything. In the case of Bluetooth and DOCSIS licensing, pool rates have been driven down to royalty-free levels, which means that the product markets are the only way to make money from patented technologies in those standards.

All suppliers need sanctions against non-payers

In product and service trading, if a customer does not pay for what it receives, its suppliers will soon stop supplying. Not so with patented technologies. The published standards documents, patent filings and SEP declarations reveal technologies and their application openly to all. The only way a patent holder can withhold supply of its intellectual property is through an injunction. But these are notoriously longwinded and difficult to obtain—if they can ever be obtained at all— particularly for patents that have been declared standard essential by their owners. Europe has the well-established Huawei v. ZTE framework for determining under what conditions and developments injunctions can be applied for and then issued. The direction of US public policy on this matter is unclear with President Biden’s executive order asking the Justice and Commerce Departments to reconsider the previous administration’s position that patent holders have the right to seek injunctions against potential SEP licensees.

Fair and calmer conditions ahead

For now, the outlook in FRAND licensing appears relatively peaceful. In addition to the numerous agreements that are negotiated and licensed without dispute, recent FRAND licensing settlements following litigation between Ericsson and Samsung, InterDigital and Xiaomi and Ericsson and TCL, signal increasing calm in smartphone licensing. For example, with the US District Court’s FRAND-licensing determinations for 2G, 3G and 4G LTE in TCL v. Ericsson unanimously and entirely vacated on appeal, the parties have subsequently settled confidentially rather than go to retrial with a jury.

A licensing agreement at the car OEM level —following years of litigation between Nokia and Daimler and an EU antitrust complaint about where in the supply chain SEPs should be licensed—is a major breakthrough in the way cars and their components are licensed. This bodes well for dealing with the complexities elsewhere in IoT licensing, with numerous different applications, devices and component manufacturers and OEMs. However, this is still only the very beginning of that saga.

This article was originally published in RCR Wireless on 3rd September 2021.

Who Benefits from the Fruit of Research from Human Cells? Civil Rights Attorney Representing Henrietta Lacks Family

In a fascinating turn of events, Ben Crump, the prominent civil rights attorney who represented the family of Treyvon Martin and Breonna Taylor, is representing the family of Henrietta Lacks, a deceased African-American woman.  Ms. Lacks’ cells were used without her consent to develop a cell line at Johns Hopkins Hospital (extracted from her in 1951).  There is a book and movie concerning her story.  According to Johns Hopkins Medicine’s website honoring Ms. Lacks:

Today, these incredible cells— nicknamed "HeLa" cells, from the first two letters of her first and last names — are used to study the effects of toxins, drugs, hormones and viruses on the growth of cancer cells without experimenting on humans. They have been used to test the effects of radiation and poisons, to study the human genome, to learn more about how viruses work, and played a crucial role in the development of the polio vaccine.

. . . Over the past several decades, this cell line has contributed to many medical breakthroughs, from research on the effects of zero gravity in outer space and the development of the polio vaccine, to the study of leukemia, the AIDS virus and cancer worldwide.

The website also states:

In 2013, Johns Hopkins worked with members of the family and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to help broker an agreement that requires scientists to receive permission to use Henrietta Lacks’ genetic blueprint, or to use HeLa cells in NIH funded research.

The committee tasked with deciding who can use HeLa cells now includes two members of the Lacks family. The medical research community has also made significant strides in improving research practices, in part thanks to the lessons learned from Henrietta Lacks’ story.

Moreover, the legal area and practices have developed since 1951, including the development of informed consent laws.  The website also notes that John Hopkins was one of the few hospitals that accepted poor African Americans as patients in 1951. 

The likely defendants will include pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies as well as John Hopkins.  This case—assuming it survives many legal challenges and is not settled relatively early (those are big “ifs”)—could result in some very interesting law on the merits that may be challenging to the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries. 

In 1990, the California Supreme Court basically decided in Moore v. Regents of the University of California that a patient did not retain a property interest in tissue extracted from him.  Notably, his cells were also used to develop a cell line.  The majority’s decision was influenced by prudential concerns, including expressed fear about impeding the development of the promising biotechnology industry.  Importantly, the case was decided when the biotechnology industry was arguably quite young and the reasoning in that case was based on some factors that may not hold true today—due to changes in the law, the development of technology, and changing expectations and practices.  Other courts in the United States, in deciding similar issues, have basically stated that equity (unjust enrichment) may provide hope for some compensation to the party whose cells have been utilized by researchers.  A rejection of Moore would have interesting implications for the field and the preservation and protection of human dignity. 

The timing of the filing of the lawsuits is interesting because my guess is that public opinion of the pharmaceutical/biotechnology industry is relatively high in the United States given the development of the vaccines for COVID-19.  However, the continuing disaster of the failure to get enough vaccines to the Global South and other parts of the world will result in additional human death and suffering, including the proliferation of variants which may evade vaccines.  This could turn the tide of public opinion in the United States—along with high pharmaceutical prices—and result in additional pressure to settle. 

Rewards for Information on Cyberattacks Paying Off Already?

On July 15, 2021, the U.S. State Department announced that up to $10 million rewards would be provided to informants with information concerning cyberattacks sponsored by or on behalf of foreign governments.  Details of the program can be found here and here.   Notably, today, the White House has announced that the United States and its allies have determined that the Chinese government has utilized contract criminal hackers in cybersecurity hacking involving zero day vulnerabilities in Microsoft’s Exchange Server.  The Biden Administration notes generally that:

[United States Department of Justice] imposing costs and announcing criminal charges against four MSS [PRC Ministry of State Security] hackers.

The US Department of Justice is announcing criminal charges against four MSS hackers addressing activities concerning a multiyear campaign targeting foreign governments and entities in key sectors, including maritime, aviation, defense, education, and healthcare in a least a dozen countries. DOJ documents outline how MSS hackers pursued the theft of Ebola virus vaccine research and demonstrate that the PRC’s theft of intellectual property, trade secrets, and confidential business information extends to critical public health information. Much of the MSS activity alleged in the Department of Justice’s charges stands in stark contrast to the PRC’s bilateral and multilateral commitments to refrain from engaging in cyber-enabled theft of intellectual property for commercial advantage.

The Biden Administration notes that it “working around the clock” to address cybersecurity issues.  Here are some of the measures the Administration is taking:

• The Administration has funded five cybersecurity modernization efforts across the Federal government to modernize network defenses to meet the threat. These include state-of-the-art endpoint security, improving logging practices, moving to a secure cloud environment, upgrading security operations centers, and deploying multi-factor authentication and encryption technologies.
• The Administration is implementing President Biden’s Executive Order to improve the nation’s cybersecurity and protect Federal government networks. The E.O. contains aggressive but achievable implementation milestones, and to date we have met every milestone on time including:
  
  
• The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) convened a workshop with almost 1000 participants from industry, academia, and government to obtain input on best practices for building secure software.
• NIST issued guidelines for the minimum standards that should be used by vendors to test the security of their software. This shows how we are leveraging federal procurement to improve the security of software not only used by the federal government but also used by companies, state and local governments, and individuals. 
• The National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) published minimum elements for a Software Bill of Materials, as a first step to improve transparency of software used by the American public.  
• The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) established a framework to govern how Federal civilian agencies can securely use cloud services.
• We continue to work closely with the private sector to address cybersecurity vulnerabilities of critical infrastructure. The Administration announced an Industrial Control System Cybersecurity Initiative in April and launched the Electricity Subsector Action Plan as a pilot. Under this pilot, we have already seen over 145 of 255 priority electricity entities that service over 76 million American customers adopt ICS cybersecurity monitoring technologies to date, and that number keeps growing. The Electricity Subsector pilot will be followed by similar pilots for pipelines, water, and chemical.
• The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) issued Security Directive 1 to require critical pipeline owners and operators to adhere to cybersecurity standards. Under this directive, those owners and operators are required to report confirmed and potential cybersecurity incidents to CISA and to designate a Cybersecurity Coordinator, to be available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. The directive also requires critical pipeline owners and operators to review their current practices as well as to identify any gaps and related remediation measures to address cyber-related risks and report the results to TSA and CISA within 30 days. In days to come, TSA will issue Security Directive 2 to further support the pipeline industry in enhancing its cybersecurity and that strengthen the public-private partnership so critical to the cybersecurity of our homeland.

By exposing the PRC’s malicious activity, we are continuing the Administration’s efforts to inform and empower system owners and operators to act. We call on private sector companies to follow the Federal government’s lead and take ambitious measures to augment and align cybersecurity investments with the goal of minimizing future incidents.

Biden Administration Executive Order on Competition: Some IP Portions

On July 9, 2021, the Biden Administration released an “Executive Order on Promoting Competition in the American Economy” that literally will touch almost every part of the U.S. economy.  The Executive Order can be found, here.  Concerning SEPs the Executive Order states:

To avoid the potential for anticompetitive extension of market power beyond the scope of granted patents, and to protect standard-setting processes from abuse, the Attorney General and the Secretary of Commerce are encouraged to consider whether to revise their position on the intersection of the intellectual property and antitrust laws, including by considering whether to revise the Policy Statement on Remedies for Standards-Essential Patents Subject to Voluntary F/RAND Commitments issued jointly by the Department of Justice, the United States Patent and Trademark Office, and the National Institute of Standards and Technology on December 19, 2019.

The Order further directs the FTC Chair to consider rulemaking in the following areas:

          (i)    unfair data collection and surveillance practices that may damage competition, consumer autonomy, and consumer privacy;
          (ii)   unfair anticompetitive restrictions on third-party repair or self-repair of items, such as the restrictions imposed by powerful manufacturers that prevent farmers from repairing their own equipment;
          (iii)  unfair anticompetitive conduct or agreements in the prescription drug industries, such as agreements to delay the market entry of generic drugs or biosimilars;
          (iv)   unfair competition in major Internet marketplaces;
. . . and
          (vii)  any other unfair industry-specific practices that substantially inhibit competition.

The Order directs the Secretary of Agriculture to prepare a report concerning IP laws and seeds and other inputs:

to help ensure that the intellectual property system, while incentivizing innovation, does not also unnecessarily reduce competition in seed and other input markets beyond that reasonably contemplated by the Patent Act (see 35 U.S.C. 100 et seq. and 7 U.S.C. 2321 et seq.), in consultation with the Under Secretary of Commerce for Intellectual Property and Director of the United States Patent and Trademark Office, submit a report to the Chair of the White House Competition Council, enumerating and describing any relevant concerns of the Department of Agriculture and strategies for addressing those concerns across intellectual property, antitrust, and other relevant laws.

The Order directs the Secretary for Health and Human Services to address drug access and pricing:

          (iv)    not later than 45 days after the date of this order, submit a report to the Assistant to the President for Domestic Policy and Director of the Domestic Policy Council and to the Chair of the White House Competition Council, with a plan to continue the effort to combat excessive pricing of prescription drugs and enhance domestic pharmaceutical supply chains, to reduce the prices paid by the Federal Government for such drugs, and to address the recurrent problem of price gouging;
          (v)     to lower the prices of and improve access to prescription drugs and biologics, continue to promote generic drug and biosimilar competition, as contemplated by the Drug Competition Action Plan of 2017 and Biosimilar Action Plan of 2018 of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), including by:
               (A)  continuing to clarify and improve the approval framework for generic drugs and biosimilars to make generic drug and biosimilar approval more transparent, efficient, and predictable, including improving and clarifying the standards for interchangeability of biological products;
               (B)  as authorized by the Advancing Education on Biosimilars Act of 2021 (Public Law 117-8, 135 Stat. 254, 42 U.S.C. 263-1), supporting biosimilar product adoption by providing effective educational materials and communications to improve understanding of biosimilar and interchangeable products among healthcare providers, patients, and caregivers;
               (C)  to facilitate the development and approval of biosimilar and interchangeable products, continuing to update the FDA’s biologics regulations to clarify existing requirements and procedures related to the review and submission of Biologics License Applications by advancing the “Biologics Regulation Modernization” rulemaking (RIN 0910-AI14); and
               (D)  with the Chair of the FTC, identifying and addressing any efforts to impede generic drug and biosimilar competition, including but not limited to false, misleading, or otherwise deceptive statements about generic drug and biosimilar products and their safety or effectiveness;
          (vi)    to help ensure that the patent system, while incentivizing innovation, does not also unjustifiably delay generic drug and biosimilar competition beyond that reasonably contemplated by applicable law, not later than 45 days after the date of this order, through the Commissioner of Food and Drugs, write a letter to the Under Secretary of Commerce for Intellectual Property and Director of the United States Patent and Trademark Office enumerating and describing any relevant concerns of the FDA; 
          (vii)   to support the market entry of lower-cost generic drugs and biosimilars, continue the implementation of the law widely known as the CREATES Act of 2019 (Public Law 116-94, 133 Stat. 3130), by:
               (A)  promptly issuing Covered Product Authorizations (CPAs) to assist product developers with obtaining brand-drug samples; and
               (B)  issuing guidance to provide additional information for industry about CPAs; and
          (viii)  through the Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, prepare for Medicare and Medicaid coverage of interchangeable biological products, and for payment models to support increased utilization of generic drugs and biosimilars.

The Order directs the Secretary of Commerce to reconsider proposed regulations concerning technology transfer:

   (r)  The Secretary of Commerce shall:
          (i)    acting through the Director of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), consider initiating a rulemaking to require agencies to report to NIST, on an annual basis, their contractors’ utilization activities, as reported to the agencies under 35 U.S.C. 202(c)(5);
          (ii)   acting through the Director of NIST, consistent with the policies set forth in section 1 of this order, consider not finalizing any provisions on march-in rights and product pricing in the proposed rule “Rights to Federally Funded Inventions and Licensing of Government Owned Inventions,” 86 Fed. Reg. 35 (Jan. 4, 2021); 

                (iii)  not later than 1 year after the date of this order, in consultation with the Attorney General and the Chair of the Federal Trade Commission, conduct a study, including by conducting an open and transparent stakeholder consultation process, of the mobile application ecosystem, and submit a report to the Chair of the White House Competition Council, regarding findings and recommendations for improving competition, reducing barriers to entry, and maximizing user benefit with respect to the ecosystem.

Cybersecurity Book Review: Perlroth

Nicole Perlroth's "This is How They Tell Me the World Ends" is a very engaging and entertaining book of around 470 pages concerning cybersecurity.  Ms. Perlroth is a New York Times reporter who covers cybersecurity issues.  This book is a whirlwind tour of why we are where we are at with respect to cybersecurity--at least in part.  She points to the development of the market for zero day vulnerabilities and the participation in that market by the United States government as well as other governments.  The book is based on many interviews and she effectively ties them together to make a compelling story that reads very much like a fast moving Tom Clancy book.  She does not pull many punches and takes a few shots at various U.S. presidential administrations, including finishing up on the Trump administration.  It is selling well and one would hope may lead to some people taking cybersecurity a bit more seriously.  

NFTs and Financing the Future of Potential Stars

NFTs are getting a lot of press.  For sure, NFTs have made a big splash in the art world.  I had an interesting conversation with a friend today about financing young athletes through the monetization of their right of publicity since the NCAA (and states) have begun allowing collegiate athletes to profit from their image etc.  One interesting issue concerns aspiring professional tennis players.  Often those players must make a decision between attempting to finance a shot at a professional career—a very expensive prospect, or go to college and see what develops.  Notably, as a friend mentioned to me, there are numerous excellent young tennis players who cannot finance the expenses to start a pro-career—expenses such as travel, coaching and trainer fees, hotel etc.  Many have to give up on a promising career because of a lack of funding.  Interestingly, this is a sport where economic class plays a big role—kids with less resources are unable to be developed and never get a legitimate shot at the pro-tour.  Allowing young players to monetize their right of publicity without damaging college prospects may be an interesting way for them to gather resources to support a professional career in the future and develop (maybe crowd-funding works).  Local businesses, family, friends and others could invest in young players early.  But, what if we could sweeten the deal?  What if we could use NFTs to create a market for, as an example, electronic playing cards for young athletes?  Can you imagine what the NFT “playing card” for an athlete such as a young Andre Agassi, Messi, Ronaldo, or Michael Jordan may be worth after they develop in the future?  There are a lot of details to sort out, but you can see how a market can develop creating an enormous amount of value and good (and yes, a potential for bad).  See here for Topps entry into the NFT market for trading cards: Topps Digital Launching Baseball Card NFTs (beckett.com).  What if we could expand the concept further?  There's no doubt that we are at a place where maximizing the potential of human resources is our greatest challenge.  This could be a way to help.  Extend it to brilliant children to finance their education?  IP and NFTs at their best?  It's an interesting thought experiment. 

OxFirst 6th IP and Competition Forum - The Future of FRAND

 

OxFirst is 10 Years old! Celebrate with Us.

 

Oxfirst 6th IP And Competition Forum:

Standard Essential Patents & FRAND  

1 p.m. UK time – 6 p.m. UK time 

= 

2 p.m. – 7 p.m. CET

 

In this conference, policy makers, law makers and IP and Competition practitioners will be discussing the Future of FRAND.

Ballet dancers will perform various solos.  

 

Day 1: June 23

   Topics:

• Where in the Supply Chain should one take a license?  
• Updates on Recent FRAND Disputes
• Essentiality Perspectives on SEPs              

    Key Presenters

• CEO of the UKIPO
• Mr Vajda QC, Monckton chambers, visiting Professor in King's College London, previous Judge at CJEU
• Representatives from Nokia & Audi…

Register your interest for Day 1 at

https://zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_ngMBJZprQGCSrznX4rUS0g

Day 2 : June 24

    Topics:

• The FRAND Defense  
• Anti-suit Injunctions
• Propotionality of injunctions             

   Key Presenters:

• Madame Sabotier, Head & Judge, 3rd chamber Civil Court and Head of 3rd Chamber
• Dr Zigann, Presiding Judge, Landgericht Munich
• Professor Picht, University of Zurich
• Representatives from Siemens, Deutsche Telekom..

Register your interest for Day 2 at:

https://zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_xQuQUnBFTS-W_VxYv0ecNg

Day 3: June 25

    Topics:

• Standard essential patents & AI
• Should the mandate of Standard Setting Organisations be expanded?
• International perspectives on FRAND   

   Key Presenters:

• Sir Nicholas Forwood, White & Case, Counsel & former Judge at CJEU
• Lord Justice Arnold, Judge at the Court of Appeal of England and Wales
• Representatives from IBM, Philips and Panasonic…

Register your interest for Day 3 at:

https://zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_7y6VTGAbRpSJN5jK_CPZaQ

IP Valuation

Free Webinar June 11 14h00 -15h00 GMT = 15h00-16h00 CET

Register for free at: https://zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_0IbL2HJ6QemEMIEV20UKow

What this Event is About:

The recent 1.2 billion trademark backed loan American Airlines obtained, the valuation of Michael Jackson’s ‘name and likeness’ for tax purposes, as well as the commitment of UK Courts to offer a valuation of FRAND royalty rates are good examples of the various goals an IP valuation can support. In this webinar we discuss the nexus between IP valuation and reporting systems and assess the elements needed to uncover the economic potential of IP. The traditional legal and accounting tick-boxes commonly ignore the valuation of intellectual property and are a relic of an industrial age that is not fit for an era dominated by intellectual property. Failing to keep pace with innovation and considering the economic contribution of IP risks undermining today’s entrepreneurship. This webinar is the first step to advance the debate. Join in and discuss!

Chair:

 

Lord Justice Richard Arnold: Sir Richard Arnold has been a Judge of the Court of Appeal of England and Wales since October 2019. Prior to that he was a barrister specializing in IP for 22 years and a High Court Judge for 11 years, including  6½ years as Judge in Charge of the Patents Court.

 

Speakers:

 

Zeeger Vink is IP director at MF Brands Group, which owns several fashion and lifestyle brands, including Lacoste. Mr Vink has worked in private practice in the Netherlands and the United Kingdom, focusing particularly on trademarks. He serves on the Board of Directors of INTA and is the author of ‘The great catapult: How Integrated IP Management Will Shoot Your Brand to Success.’

 

Professor Roya Ghafele has been the Director of OxFirst since 2011. In addition, she is a Visiting Professor in IP law with Brunel University London. She previously worked as an Economist for WIPO, the OECD and McKinsey and held Lectureships in International Political Economy and IP law with Oxford and Edinburgh University.

6th IP and Competition Forum - 23, 24, 25 June 2021

 

Date & Time:  23^rd-25^th June, 2021; 13:00 BST – 18:00 BST

 

https://www.oxfirst.com/6th-ip-and-competition-forum/

For the sixth time in a row, we are inviting to discuss the interplay of IP, Competition, and Public Policy. With several key questions to be addressed, such as the adequate level of licensing or the challenges presented by anti-suit injunctions, there is a dire need to calibre the role of both IP and competition law for the high-tech innovation ecosystem. More than ever before, is it important to provide thought leadership and contribute to formulating judicial and governance perspectives that will assure that IP breaks the equation of being a tool for economic growth and prosperity.

Topics

·      Anti-Suit Injunctions

·      Jurisdiction, Extraterritoriality & Comity

·      Update on Recent FRAND Cases

·      Component Level Licensing

·      Proportionality of FRAND injunctions

·      What role for Standard Setting Organizations in the eco system?

·      Essentiality of Standard Essential Patents

 

Why Join?

 ·         Contribute to Building Bridges in a highly debated policy area

·         Advance the state of Play for Markets for Standard Essential Patents

·         Hear first-hand what Judges, Academics and Public Authorities have to say on some of the hottest trends in the sector

·         Be part of a Thriving Community of Thought Leaders

 In celebration of our 10^th anniversary, we are giving out free seats to the conference!^{*(subject to availability & approval)}

Day 1: June 23 2021

https://zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_ngMBJZprQGCSrznX4rUS0g

 Day 2: June 24:

https://zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_xQuQUnBFTS-W_VxYv0ecNg

 Day 3: June 25:

https://zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_7y6VTGAbRpSJN5jK_CPZaQ

 

Enjoy, Debate and Have Fun!