First Patent Pool for 3GPP Infrastructure Launched to Help Accelerate 5G

Alium, a joint patent pool venture between MPEG LA and Unified Patents, is supporting the development of Open RAN by providing a solution to the uncertainty and risk posed by the more than 100,000 essential patents already self-declared. 

Open RAN increases competition in the telecommunications infrastructure space, enabling mobile networks to use different vendors interchangeably, thereby lowering costs. Support for Open RAN has increased significantly over the last several years. Governments around the world (including the US, India, Japan, and Australia) have declared the growth of Open RAN solutions to be strategic to their economic and national security.

But for the Open RAN market to grow to more than 220 million units by 2030 as projected, the market must address the risk and the patent uncertainty that threatens to slow adoption.

Alium was created to do that by providing a license of convenience for Radio Unit vendors to help decrease uncertainty in patent licensing fees related to their products while also providing compensation to patent holders for developing the technology.

Alium’s program is innovative:

• Offers licenses for 4G / 5G infrastructure

• Uses AI-based landscapes to determine royalty allocation (Methodology is here)

• Requires no money from patent holders to participate

• Includes a Patent Quality program to build the integrity of the Open RAN ecosystem by discouraging the assertion of invalid patents

The Alium Open RAN Radio Unit License provides a one-stop solution for vendors to receive a license with leading patent owners in a single transaction at a low per unit cost. Alium is currently signing up leading patent owners to offer the License to the market starting in Q1 2022. The full agreement is available to qualified licensors and licensees immediately.

For more information, please go to https://www.alium-llc.com/ or email: info@alium-llc.com.

Five major platforms adopt standardized patent identification format, SPIF

“This is a foundational thing, which is basically knowing what patents are involved in a transaction or some kind of interaction,” argues Shawn Ambwani, the COO of Unified Patents. “Litigation and assertion and anything related to patents are always very complicated. We should all make it as easy as possible for people to see what patents are involved.”

Cipher, Unified Patents, RPX, Aon, and Google Patents will be offering the SPIF patent identification format via their platforms in a move designed to bring more efficiency to patent transactions and portfolio management. SPIF uniquely defines patent assets so that they can be used in patent analytics, M&A, transferring patent information between firms, and buying and selling patents.

Read the article HERE on IAM’s website.

Unified seeking additional IEEE, MPEG, and 3GPP training sets

Unified Patents is seeking to license and supplement existing training sets of patents found essential and nonessential to 3GPP (5G, LTE, V2X); IEEE / 802.11 / WiFi; and Video Codecs ( VVC / H.266 and AV1). The patents and applications should be reviewed by experts and mapped against the technical specifications. This would be a joint effort and collaboration to understand fundamental technologies and their corresponding patent landscape. If you are interested in participating please contact info@unifiedpatents.com. 

Please include in any communications:

1. Technology covered, including specification number and whether user equipment or infrastructure

2. A sample of the results

3. Number of patents covered which were found to be essential and the number which were not

4. Study Methodology

Unified Brands Aims to Combat Counterfeiters

On March 3, 2021, Unified Patents launched a new subsidiary, Unified Brands, which aims to combat counterfeiters on behalf of SMEs on a ‘no cost’ basis. Unified Brands will work with small businesses to recover proceeds of counterfeiting. “Fundamentally we troll counterfeiters on behalf of companies that have counterfeiting problems,” says Shawn Ambwani, chief operating officer (COO) of Unified Patents.

As a subsidiary of Unified Patents with over 200+ international membership organization, we are very good at deterring others from profiting off IP that isn’t theirs. We scrape online marketplaces, such as Amazon, Wish, Alibaba, AliExpress, and others, to find these counterfeiters. When counterfeit products are found online, Unified Brands will protect a brand from counterfeiting and deter counterfeiters from going after that brand specifically.

Unified Brands makes money when enforcement is successful and action is taken against a range of counterfeiters selling on online marketplaces to US consumers. After paying the lawyers, Unified Brands splits whatever earned from the infringers 50-50 with the client.

Read more about Unified Brands in this great article by Trevor Little at Law Business Research.

Unified Comments on USPTO Discretionary Denials

On December 3, 2020, Unified, along with over 800 commenters, answered the USPTO's request for comments (RFC) related to their recent use of "discretionary" non-merits denials and potential future rulemaking. Early analysis of the 832 comments submitted reveals the breakdown was relatively evenly split for and against, with many form-filled or irrelevant comments. In our comments, Unified highlighted the prejudicial nature of the RFC itself, the lack of statutory authority to implement discretionary denial rules, and the USPTO's lack of data supporting the policy behind their new de facto rules.

Many Unified members submitted their own helpful comments. Thanks again to in-house counsel, Michelle Aspen and Roshan Mansinghani, and everyone who contributed to putting the comments together. Read Unified’s comments below.

Comments of Unified Patents to USPTO RFC by Jennifer M Gallagher on Scribd