On 5 April 2013, the Landgericht Düsseldorf referred questions relating to injunctive relief over standard-essential patents (“SEPs”) to the Court of Justice (“CJEU”) in connection with a patent dispute between Huawei and ZTE relating to an alleged infringement by ZTE of a patent owned by Huawei and declared to be essential in connection with the LTE standard. As the Advocate General (“AG”) put it in his 20 November Opinion, the CJEU “is called for the first time to answer whether seeking an injunction by the holder of SEP, committed to grant licences on FRAND terms, against a candidate-licensee may amount to an abuse of dominant position and which conditions apply.”
Covington published an alert on 25 November 2014 that summarises the opinion and the potential implications. Please click here to view the alert.