Google says it won't support fair licensing in open standards

[work only]

http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/12/02/08/google_says_it_wont_support_fair_licensing_in_open_standards_as_apple_microsoft_cisco_have.html


Started to piss me off, these are FRAND & open standards Google and Motorola!!!!!!!!!

[Cédric Beust ♔]

Let's get our information from more balanced news sources than appleinsider.com before getting upset about something, shall we?

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Cédric

On Thu, Feb 9, 2012 at 2:13 AM, work only <vorlo...@gmail.com> wrote:

http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/12/02/08/google_says_it_wont_support_fair_licensing_in_open_standards_as_apple_microsoft_cisco_have.html


Started to piss me off, these are FRAND & open standards Google and Motorola!!!!!!!!!

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[Russel Winder]

On Thu, 2012-02-09 at 08:03 -0800, Cédric Beust ♔ wrote:
> Let's get our information from more balanced news sources than
> appleinsider.com before getting upset about something, shall we?

The letter seems quite clear -- Google is not going to rock the boat,
but is letting the status quo ante be so that people don't have to worry
about changing circumstances.

Of course this is a patent war between the main players. Google's
position and Apple's response seem fairly obvious and to be expected in
this dance. The history of mobile telephony is one of companies trying
to ensure their patents are made integral parts of the standards so they
can generate an income stream from all players.

Microsoft is making money out of Android, it seems only fair that Google
make money out of iOS !

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[Oscar Hsieh]

Well, there is something called FRAND which stands for fair, reasonable, and non-discriminatory terms.  As far as I heard, Apple is willing to pay, they just don't want to pay 2.25% that motorola is asking for.  That is how Apple manage to have German court suspend the IPhone ban in Germany last week

http://allthingsd.com/20120203/apple-all-ipad-and-iphone-models-will-be-back-on-sale-online-in-germany-shortly/

“All iPad and iPhone models will be back on sale through Apple’s online store in Germany shortly,” an Apple spokeswoman told AllThingsD. “Apple appealed this ruling because Motorola repeatedly refuses to license this patent to Apple on reasonable terms, despite having declared it an industry standard patent seven years ago.”

Samsung is already under EU antitrust investigation since they ask 2.4% royalties for their 3G pattern. 

http://www.theverge.com/2012/1/31/2760729/antitrust-samsung-frand-eu
http://fosspatents.blogspot.com/2012/02/google-letter-to-standards-bodies.html

I am sure soon EU will do the same to Motorola if the term is not changed. 

PS.  Google pays 12 billions for Motorola and Motorola is losing money in the midst of Mobile boom.  I doubt Google can get all of its investment back.

[Reinier Zwitserloot]

Apple claims it wants this FRAND stuff yet it started this fight by asking for injunctions all over the place.

here, Cedric said it better than I can:

http://beust.com/weblog/2012/02/09/the-only-sure-way-to-lose-is-not-to-play/

[work only]

great read but information is wrong, Apple didn't start the suing, Motorola in July 2008.

Plus Motorola patents are FRAND and Apple's are not!  Just that Motorola lost the mobile game and now the only way they can make money is buy suing.




 

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[work only]

http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/12/02/11/apple_attacks_motorolas_efforts_to_block_iphone_4s_using_standards_patents_asks_for_huge_damages.html

[Karsten Silz]

This has been one of Cedric's weaker posts.

Firstly, this round of mobile patent wars (defined as in "involving Apple") didn't start in April 2011 with Apple suing Samsung. Nokia sued Apple in October 2009 (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8321058.stm), and Motorola sued Apple in October 2010 (http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/06/motorola-suing-apple-for-patent-infringement/), though Motorola was apparently expecting an Apple lawsuit. You may go back even further.

Secondly, Google wants to continue to charge 2.25% per-unit royalties for "essential patents", as announced in a letter to standards organizations (http://www.theverge.com/2012/2/8/2784786/google-promises-to-license-motorolas-standards-patents-fairly-after). "Essential patents" are required to build smartphones (e.g., 3G, voice etc.). Vendors must license them in fair, reasonable, and non-discriminatory terms to competitors if they want these patents to become part of telecom standards (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reasonable_and_non-discriminatory_licensing). Motorola wanted these exact 2.25% from Apple for one / all (???) FRAND 3G patents (http://fosspatents.blogspot.com/2012/02/motorola-wants-225-of-apples-sales-in.html). 

The problem here is that Apple thinks that 2.25% is neither fair, reasonable nor non-discriminatory. Apple's reason: Apple doesn't build cellular radios, it buys them (Infineon before, now from Qualcomm). Motorola has a patent license agreement with Qualcomm, Apple pays Qualcomm, and Motorola collects 0% from Apple. Now Apple claims that in January 2011, Motorola terminated its license agreement with Qualcomm just for Apple and then wanted to collect the royalties directly from Apple (http://fosspatents.blogspot.com/2012/02/apples-us-antisuit-lawsuit-against.html). If this is right, then this doesn't sound "non-discriminatory" to me, but that's for the courts to decide.

And how much is 2.25% anyway? The average iPhone price is $660 as of Q4/2011, the iPad one around $600 (http://www.asymco.com/2012/01/26/price-competition/). That makes 2.25% being $14.85 and $13.50. These numbers sound familiar... Oh yes, Google's Chief Legal Office lashed out at Microsoft for "seeking $15 license fees for every Android device" (http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/08/when-patents-attack-android.html). I guess seeking $14.85 for every iPhone is ok now when you spend $12 billion on a phone maker that has lost money nearly every quarter for the last five years (in this diagram, Motorola's profits are the little green areas on top of Nokias profits in 2010: http://www.asymco.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/Screen-Shot-2012-02-03-at-2-3-12.37.20-PM.png).

Thirdly, yes, life is unfair to Motorola because it owns a lot of FRAND patents that it can't collect much dough from (which is why I think Google seriously overpaid for Moto), whereas Apple (and Microsoft) can do with most of its patents what it wants to do. And yes, Apple is hypocritical by asking for FRAND licensing standards (http://www.mobileburn.com/18483/news/apple-asks-europe-to-standardize-frand-patent-licensing-for-mobile-devices) while suing Samsung for highly questionable design decisions. But Motorola itself agreed to the FRAND terms for its essential patents, so it can't take a 180 degree turn and collecting big time on Apple - the EU already investigates Samsung which did the same (http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2012/01/eu-launches-official-investigation-into-samsungs-3g-frand-patent-lawsuits.ars).

[Cédric Beust ♔]

On Sun, Feb 12, 2012 at 2:51 PM, Karsten Silz <karste...@gmail.com> wrote:

This has been one of Cedric's weaker posts.

I beg to differ, I have written much worse.

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Cédric

[Karsten Silz]

:-)

[Karsten Silz]

Correction: "while suing Samsung for highly questionable design patents".

Both the EU and the US approved the purchase of Motorola yesterday. The US Justice Department did say this about standard essential patents (SEP): "Google’s commitments were more ambiguous [than Apple and Microsoft] and do not provide the same direct confirmation of its SEP licensing policies" Again, Motorola / Google are in worse position here than Apple & Microsoft since they can't wield their FRAND patents as weapons as much as Apple / Microsoft do with their non-standard patents.

[Oscar Hsieh]

I read a good article on theverge about FRAND today

http://www.theverge.com/2012/2/16/2786970/FRAND-smartphone-industry-apple-motorola-samsung

It talks about why FRAND exists, how it helps the industry and why the lawsuit between moto/samsung and apple threaten to disrupt the balance in the industry thus brings attention from EU/DOJ and companies like Microsoft and Cisco.

Personally I am sick and tire of these lawsuits as most of you do but I found this article fair and educational (unlike some weblogs that just rant without substance) I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I do.  

Thanks

On Tue, Feb 14, 2012 at 6:37 AM, Karsten Silz <karste...@gmail.com> wrote:

Correction: "while suing Samsung for highly questionable design patents".

Both the EU and the US approved the purchase of Motorola yesterday. The US Justice Department did say this about standard essential patents (SEP): "Google’s commitments were more ambiguous [than Apple and Microsoft] and do not provide the same direct confirmation of its SEP licensing policies" Again, Motorola / Google are in worse position here than Apple & Microsoft since they can't wield their FRAND patents as weapons as much as Apple / Microsoft do with their non-standard patents.

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