Patents in ICT: academic view

U.Spagnolini

CommTech Talks @ PoliMi – June 5, 2013

Protezione dell’innovazione nel campo dell’ICT – CommTech Talks 2013

IP from academia

Goal  of  the  academia:  •  Have  good  ideas  and  make  high  quality  research  •  Publish  the  methods/results  to  be  peer  reviewed  by  peers  •  Exchange  ideas  and  methods  with  other  peers  to  improve/refine  the  

research  

•  Patents  are  not  the  main  focus  of  researchers  as  «it  slow-­‐down  the  cycle»  (=delay  publicaGons  &  exchange  ideas)  

•  Having  the  research  as  part  of  any  standard  is  just  a  dream  that  can  be  made  reality  only  if  there  is  one  industry  moGvated  to  do  so  

Goal  of  the  industry:  •  Spend  in  R&D  with  minimum  risk  to  maximize  the  raGo  income  to  R&D  

expenditure  •  Have  the  most  innovaGve  and  unique  product  that  creates  value    (we  do  not  consider  the  case  1patent=1product=1company)  

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Protezione dell’innovazione nel campo dell’ICT – CommTech Talks 2013

Innovation in industry vs academia

A  simplified  model  of  the  innovaGon  loops  

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Protezione dell’innovazione nel campo dell’ICT – CommTech Talks 2013

Patent as “technical contract”

Research  outcome  to  patent  is  the  criGcal  part    Assuming  that  a  researcher  is  willing  to  patent  the  idea  (not  always  true):  •  Researcher  is  focused  to  highlight  the  innovaGve  methods  (e.g.,  effecGve  algorithm,  new  

equaGons,  etc…)  as  these  are  valued  by  peers  •  Patent  is  a  legal  documents  where  it  is  used  “words”  in  Claim  structure  to  protect  the  

innovaGon  (it’s  like  a  contract,  wording  is  the  only  part  used  by  Court  to  defend  your  rights)  •  Patent  needs  not  to  be  valued  by  peers!  •  Patent  aYorney  does  not  just  “translate  the  scienGfic  paper  into  legal  words”  but  forecasts  all  

legal  issues  that  might  raise  to  legally  defend  the  idea  in  Court  in  future  (Patent  AYorney  writes  a  technical  contract)  

Example:  A  and  B  communicate  in  noisy  environment  but  they  need  to  set  a  common  language  •  Researcher  view:  find  the  “best  algorithm”  to  let  A  and  B  communicate    •  Patent  A0orney  view:  in  order  to  let  A  and  B  communicate,  they  need  to  agree  before.  Claim  

the  hand-­‐shake  signaling  is  a  stronger  patent  (=easier  to  be  defended  in  Court)  than  the  algorithm  and  equaGons!  

 

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Protezione dell’innovazione nel campo dell’ICT – CommTech Talks 2013

The balance of royalties 6

20 x IMU’12 (IMU’12=4B€)

+15 x IMU’12

-6 x IMU’12

Protezione dell’innovazione nel campo dell’ICT – CommTech Talks 2013

Value of damages and patents (an example) 7

IMU’12 4B€

Apple vs Samsung (Aug.’12)

Ponte sullo stretto 8.5B€ (penale 300M€)

Protezione dell’innovazione nel campo dell’ICT – CommTech Talks 2013

R&D expenditure 8

R&D  expenditure  alone  is  not  enough  to  jusGfy  the  unbalance  between  EU  and  US  

Protezione dell’innovazione nel campo dell’ICT – CommTech Talks 2013

Tablets and IPs 9

May 2005

Protezione dell’innovazione nel campo dell’ICT – CommTech Talks 2013

Standard & Standard Essential Patents

•  In  complex  products  (e.g.,  cell-­‐phone)  every  patent  is  one  piece  in  a  complex  se]ng    •  Standard  guarantees  the  inter-­‐operability  of  mulGvendor  devices  (scale  economies)  •  «UMTS  device»  means  that  it  is  guarateed  interoperability  with  UMTS  network  

•  Patent  is  a  legal  tool  to  guarantee  the  monopoly  of  the  research  outcomes  

•  Every  industry  offers  to  others  its  patents  to  be  part  of  the  Standard  (e.g.,  GSM,  UMTS,  LTE,...)  at  FRAND  (Fair,  Reasonable,  and  Non-­‐Discriminatory)  licensing  condiGons.    

•  Licensing  a  patent  in  FRAND  terms  is  mandatory  before  being  accepted  to  become  part  of  a  standards  body  approved  technical  standard  (e.g.,  Qualcomm's  WCDMA  patents  make  up  part  of  the  UMTS  standard  put  together  by  the  3GPP)  

•  Every  patent  can  be  self-­‐declared  (to  ETSI)  as  EssenGal  for  the  Standard  and  it  is  in  a  database  of  EssenGal  Patents  (www.etsi.org/services/ipr-­‐database)  

•  Any  patent  self-­‐declared  as  «essenGal»  is  not  always  truly  essenGal.  

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Protezione dell’innovazione nel campo dell’ICT – CommTech Talks 2013

3GPP&3GPP2 essential patents 11

Approx. 21% of declared patents are actually essential

[Goodman & Myers, IEEE 2005]

Protezione dell’innovazione nel campo dell’ICT – CommTech Talks 2013

What’s in LTE? 12

Start of LTE standardization

Number  of  patents  vs  Gme  shows  an  exploding  situaGon  where  players  are  preparing  for  a  big-­‐business  

Protezione dell’innovazione nel campo dell’ICT – CommTech Talks 2013

It’s an equilibrium among existing players

•  Patents  and  royalGes  are  part  of  peer-­‐to-­‐peer  equilibria  (between  inflow&ouhlow)  that  can  be  ruled  by  agreements,  IPR  exchange  or  Courts  

•  Any  new-­‐entry  is  impaired  by  IPR  with  respect  to  these  pre-­‐exisGng  equilibria    •  Lawsuits  and  Court  are  heartquakes  that  change  these  equilibria  and  let  the  

players  to  beYer  value  their  invenGons  

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