On January 13, 2021, ACT | The App Association and other organizations sent a memo of recommendations to the Biden-Harris Administration regarding possible policy priorities and actions the new administration can take to curb abuse of standard-essential patent licensing. To read the full memo, click here.
(WASHINGTON, DC) December 19, 2019– Today, ACT | The App Association released a statement from president Morgan Reed regarding a new policy statement from the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) regarding remedies for standard-essential patents (SEPs) subject [...]
Published: 6/2/16 Because of the interconnectedness of our economy and technology development, the collective decisions by policymakers, courts, and regulators around the world create the conditions that weave the fabric of innovation. ACT | The App Association therefore urges that the planned Green Paper clearly establish the U.S. government’s role [...]
Published: 3/31/16In its revised intellectual property enforcement guidelines, the Canadian Competition Bureau recognizes patent hold up as a competition concern. Specifically, it notes that high switching costs may create market power for the owners of patents that cover a standard due to the inability of firms using the standard to [...]
Published: 2/2/15 This Business Review Letter (“BRL”) affirms the U.S. Justice Department’s intention not to challenge on antitrust grounds the proposed revisions to the IEEE’s patent policy (“IEEE Revisions”). The IEEE’s revisions concern the terms of letters of assurance (“LOAs”) through which participants in IEEE-SA standards development make licensing commitments [...]
Published: 7/30/13In this statement, the FTC explained the potential of FRAND abuse to facilitate hold-up of standard implementers. The Commission stated that “incorporating patented technologies into standards also has the potential to distort competition by enabling SEP holders to use the leverage that they may acquire as a result of [...]
Published: 1/8/13 In this joint statement, the U.S. Justice Department’s Antitrust Division and the Patent and Trademark Office addressed the benefits of collaborative standards development through standards organizations and the risks to competition associated with patent hold-up, which may occur after standardization. According to the statement, “when a standard incorporates [...]
Published: 7/11/12 As part of its statement, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission noted that “a SEP owner [has] the ability to demand and obtain royalty payments much higher than might have been available prior to adoption of the standard because these rates need not be based on the true market [...]
Published: 7/11/12In this testimony, the U.S. Justice Department’s Antitrust Division explains the potential for standardization to enable SEP holders to engage in patent hold-up, “such as by excluding a competitor from a market or obtaining an unjustifiably higher price for its invention than would have been possible before the standard [...]
Published: 6/1/12 In its statement, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission urged the ITC to consider that “a royalty negotiation that occurs under threat of an exclusion order may be weighted heavily in favor of the patentee in a way that is in tension with the RAND commitment. High switching costs [...]