According to media reports, Ericsson has won the lawsuit against Apple in Colombia. iPhone12 series, iPhone13 series and iPad products that support 5G function will be banned from sale. This is undoubtedly a huge blow to Apple. What’s interesting is Apple immediately returned to its home country, the United States, to file a countersuit, demanding compensation from Ericsson.
U.S. companies are undoubtedly the most skilled in using patent rights to ban products from other countries. A large proportion of patent trolls that have appeared repeatedly over the years are U.S. companies. In the early years, patent trolls were rampant and grabbed huge amounts of revenue around the world. However, as patent trolls The rampage of the epidemic eventually caused trouble for the United States itself and seriously hindered the development of American science and technology.
Former President Obama finally realized the harm of patent trolls to American technology during his tenure. In 2013, Obama promoted some measures to curb American patent trolls. Only then did the patent trolls in the United States come under control. Patent trolls were significantly reduced, and some patent trolls turned to other countries. Travel to Europe. The behavior of
patent trolls has also caused huge troubles to Chinese companies. Many Chinese companies have also been banned due to patent trolls. However, as the technology research and development capabilities of Chinese companies have continued to increase in the past decade, Chinese companies have been sued by patent trolls. The number of cases has dropped significantly.
Unexpectedly, American companies have also begun to suffer patent lawsuits. However, this time, well-known companies such as Ericsson took action personally, and the company they dealt with was Apple, a well-known company in the United States. Ericsson now and then sues other companies for patent infringement from time to time. This is undoubtedly because Obtain patent fees, and Apple is not so easy to deal with.
Ericsson is actually not having a good time nowadays. The results announced in the first quarter of this year showed that its net profit margin was only 6.4%. It also suffered losses in 2019. Since 2020, as Chinese communication equipment manufacturers have encountered obstacles in overseas markets, Ericsson and Nokia The two European communication equipment manufacturers are doing better. However, these two communication equipment manufacturers still have unsatisfactory performance in the overseas market without the competitor Huawei .
In order to save their performance, Ericsson and Nokia began to focus on patent fees. In recent years, they have frequently sued other companies on the grounds of patent infringement. This time Ericsson sued Apple, which is also a very tough company. In the past few years, Apple and Samsung and Qualcomm have launched lengthy patent litigations. Naturally, Apple will not be polite to Ericsson.
After Ericsson sued Apple in Colombia, Apple chose to return to its home country, the United States, to counter-sue Ericsson. The purpose should be to use the strong position of the United States to try to force Ericsson to reconcile with Apple as soon as possible. Considering Apple's current power in the United States, United States The court's side may also favor Apple.
Regarding this matter, I am afraid that the matter was settled quickly in the end. After all, the U.S. market is already an important market for Ericsson. Since Chinese communication equipment manufacturers cannot enter the U.S. market, most of the U.S. communication equipment market is shared by Ericsson and Nokia. Such huge profits are obviously More important than the royalties collected from Apple.
The scene of Apple returning to the United States to countersuit Ericsson is so familiar. I think back when many Chinese companies were sued by patent trolls in overseas markets, Chinese companies had no choice but to accept their tyranny and pay huge patent fees, or they had no choice but to give up. In overseas markets, American companies probably didn't expect that they would also encounter this scene, right?
