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Google and Samsung exchange Patent deals
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Tuesday, February 4, 2014
Google and Samsung Electronics have signed a broad agreement to cross-license a range of each other’s patents, bolstering ties between the two main powers behind the global pre-eminence of the Android operating system for smartphones.
The deal, announced late Sunday, comes amid a proliferation of patent litigation among technology companies and so-called patent trolls, who buy up patents to enforce intellectual property rights — through the courts, if needed.
Google and Samsung said the agreement covered existing patents as well as some that would be filed during the next 10 years. Although a “broad range of technologies and business areas” are covered, the deal does not cover every patent that each company holds.
The companies did not disclose terms of the arrangement, including whether there would be a financial consideration for the use of each other’s patents.
Samsung has been locked in a range of patent disputes with Apple, its archrival in the smartphone business. Apple and Google have been fighting a patent battle involving Motorola Mobility, which Google acquired in 2012.
On Monday, Samsung also agreed to pay the Swedish telecom company Ericsson roughly $650 million and future undisclosed royalties to resolve a separate patent dispute. Ericsson had sued Samsung over alleged patent infringements in 2012, which led Samsung to file a counter-claim. The agreement on Monday resolves these legal issues, and will allow Samsung to license patents related to mobile network infrastructure and handset touch-screens from Ericsson.
Google, which developed Android software, and Samsung, the leading maker of phones that use the operating system, have had a highly productive though largely unofficial partnership until now. Android had an 81 percent share of the global market for smartphone operating systems in the third quarter of 2013, according to the research firm International Data Corporation, well ahead of its nearest rival, Apple’s iOS, with 13 percent.
The patent deal stops short of a 10-year agreement by Samsung to use Android, but also suggests that speculation about possible disagreements between the two companies might have been exaggerated, analysts said.
By: DocMemory
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