NPE targets Apple with FRAND lawsuit in 5G litigation campaign
Apex Beam Technologies said tech giant failed to negotiate in good faith for SEPs | Non-practising entity has also sued competitors including Samsung and OnePlus.
Apple was hit with a lawsuit in Texas this week, with allegations that it had breached its fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory (FRAND) obligations by failing to obtain a proper licence for certain 5G standard-essential patents (SEPs).
On Monday (April 29), non-practising entity Apex Beam Technologies (ABT) claimed that the tech giant had engaged in “holdout behaviour” and failed to negotiate in good faith to licence its SEPs.
ABT told the Western District of Texas court that Apple was required to have a licence for one or more essential patents it owned, covering wireless communication technology.
The NPE said it had contacted Apple in May 2023 with the offer of a licence on FRAND terms for several essential patents it owned.
However, Apple and its representatives had declined to respond with any proposed rate for a licence to use ABT’s patents, according to the suit, thus violating Apple’s FRAND commitment “by depriving ABT of its rights as a third-party beneficiary”.
“Defendant has failed to negotiate in good faith and has engaged in holdout behaviour to extract unfair licensing terms,” ABT said.
According to a letter between the parties excerpted in the lawsuit, Apple had been directed to complaints for patent infringement by ABT against its competitors Samsung, TCL, OnePlus and ZTE “which explicitly set forth the mappings of Apex Beam’s patents to the 5G standards which are practised by Apple’s 5G-enabled products”.
ABT asked the court for “damages suffered from Apple’s breach of its FRAND obligations and restitution to compensate for Apple’s unjust enrichment”.
Apex Beam Technologies is represented by Raymond Mort of The Mort Law Firm, and Alfred Fabricant, Peter Lambrianakos and Vincent Rubino of Fabricant.
Multiple suits over 5G technology
ABT first sued Samsung in June 2022, alleging infringement of five patents related to wireless communication systems, to which Samsung initiated inter partes review.
Those patents are US patent numbers 10,462,767; 10,568,113; 10,912,081; 10,944,527; and 10,951,271.
The NPE filed another suit against Samsung on March 20 this year, accusing it of infringing a further 12 patents issued between 2021 and 2024 related to “systems and methods for transmission schemes” in wireless communication.
It claimed Samsung had implemented its patented technology in various Galaxy mobile handsets, tablets, and notebooks with 5G functionality.
Apex Beam began its 5G litigation campaign in 2021, suing TCT Mobile for allegedly infringing the five wireless communication patents listed above, followed by lawsuits against OnePlus and ZTE in 2022.
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