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December 03, 2013

Court Ruling Blocks HTC One Mini Sales in the U.K.

We have another little patent war going on. This time it is between Nokia and HTC. According to Bloomberg, Nokia has received a favorable ruling from a London judge. Nokia is suing HTC over patent infringements.

At the end of October 2013, Nokia scored a win in a patent case against HTC in the U.K. The patent in question is EP0998024. Its title is “Modular Structure for a Transmitter and a Mobile Station.” According to FOSS patents it is a rather powerful mobile phone patent.

The London court ruled that patent EP0998024 was valid and is infringed by various HTC products. Unfortunately for HTC, this includes its flagship HTC One smartphone. In addition to the U.K., Nokia is also suing HTC over this patent in the U.S., Germany, Japan and Italy.

In response to this ruling, Nokia had the following to say, “Today’s judgment is a significant development in our dispute with HTC. Nokia will now seek an injunction against the import and sale of infringing HTC products in the UK as well as financial compensation. Local counterparts of this patent are already in suit against HTC in Germany, Italy, Japan and the US.”

That brings us up to today’s ruling. Judge Richard Arnold ruled that HTC could not sell its HTC One Mini phone in the U.K. The date set is December 6, 2013. After this date, HTC will not be able to sell the Mini due to patent infringement.

The flagship smartphone was globally released by HTC in March of this year. Since that time it has been selling in the U.K. as well as other parts of the world. Although Judge Arnold found that the original HTC One also contained microchips that infringed on Nokia’s patent, he did postpone an injunction against the smartphone.

This will give HTC an opportunity to appeal the ruling. In his ruling, the judge said that blocking sales of the HTC One in the U.K. could cause “considerable” damage to HTC. Released recently, the HTC One Mini and Max are smaller and larger versions of the flagship smartphone.

Even before this ruling, HTC reported a net loss of revenue for third quarter 2013. There have been manufacturing problems with the HTC One Mini. A report from Reuters says that design issues with the HTC One mini have led to slow yields, which have led to low demand. So you can see what an additional blow this is to HTC if it cannot sell either HTC smartphone in the U.K.

According to Bloomberg, it tried to reach HTC for comments, but their calls have yet to be answered. Judge Arnold said that HTC’s argument is that the microchips found to infringe Nokia patents were “a very small component” and didn’t justify a sales ban.

A couple of years ago, Nokia sued Apple in 2011 over the same patent. That case was settled with Nokia agreeing to grant Apple a license to use the microchips. In a statement Nokia said “Nokia is also claiming financial compensation for the infringement of this patent.”




Edited by Cassandra Tucker


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