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US: Top patent court declares landmark licensing fee rules

By  |  December 7, 2014

The nation’s top patent court issued a landmark decision last Thursday that declares how patent licensing fees should be determined, reports say.

The US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit declared that those fees should be based on the incremental value of each invention and not the value of the standard as a whole. The ruling also limited the ability to argue that patents are misused to gain higher royalties in some cases.

Reports say the decision was the first by any appeals court.

The ruling was made on technology giant Ericsson’s contribution to industry standard for Wi-Fi, which incorporates more than one thousand patents, according to reports. Those standards are set by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, which is currently debating changes that could possibly contradict this court ruling.

Full content: Bloomberg

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