5G RAN Developments: A Look at Licensing Defenses

Changes in the 5G radio access network (RAN) – and in particular network disaggregation – could make the monetization of patents essential to RAN equipment and operations (5G RAN SEPs) more challenging. Some of the challenges arise from identifying directly liable infringers in a disaggregated, multi-component system.

“Non-practicing licensing entities should find [the 5G RAN] market attractive provided they are able to source quality patents focusing on discrete functions performed by single entities. Traditional RAN vendors with licensable portfolios are likely finding the new market disconcerting, leaving them with existential questions.”

This final part of the three-part series (read Part 1 and Part 2) addresses other challenges to the monetization of 5G RAN SEPs such as the implementation of parts of the 5G RAN using open source software, patent exhaustion, and vendor indemnifications.

Continue reading the full article on IPWatchdog’s website HERE. This article is the third part in a series written by Craig Thompson, General Manager and COO for Unified Consulting.

5G RAN SEPs Likely to Encourage a Frenzy of Activity

The rapidly changing 5G RAN and the growth forecasts for the equipment market promises to attract 5G RAN SEP monetization. The large number and diverse ownership of 5G RAN SEPs should encourage a frenzy of monetization activity.

As of January 2021, nearly 33,000 active patent families have been self-declared to 5G. Of those families, over 63% or 20,750 families have been self-declared specifically to 5G RAN infrastructure. These families comprise nearly 70,000 active patents and applications. The pie chart below developed from Unified Patents’ objective patent landscaping tool (OPAL) shows the top 20 ownership of those families.

Continue reading the full article on IPWatchdog’s website HERE. This article is the second part in a series written by Craig Thompson, General Manager and COO for Unified Consulting.

5G RAN Developments: Challenges and Opportunities for Patent Licensing in a 5G Future

Much has been said about how 5G will better use the airwaves, giving wings to new communications between people and between devices. Little has been said though about how 5G could change markets and industries. The equipment market for the radio access network (RAN) is a good example of just one market that is now caught in the updraft of such change. Another market bound to rise is the market for patent licensing—and, in particular, standard essential patent licensing for 5G RAN. To help make sense of the 5G patent licensing market, we have developed an AI-based 5G landscaping tool to help identify and weigh the relative patent portfolios (OPAL) and an indexed repository of all technical contributions made to 3GPP 2G-5G standardization work (OPEN).

Continue reading the full article on IPWatchdog’s website HERE. This is article is the first in a series written by Craig Thompson, General Manager and COO for Unified Consulting. In Part II of this series, he will address the licensing challenges unique to the RAN market.

Unified Consulting 5G study finds significant submarine patents

Unified Consulting (UC), a sister company to Unified Patents, recently completed a study on 5G and identified using the 5G OPAL (Objective PAtent Landscape) tool which evaluated over 1,000,000 patents for essentiality based on participation and almost 100,000 self-declared patents. It is based on the OPEN 3GPP (Standard Submission Repository) with over 200,000 3GPP / 5G contributions and a methodology using an AI based semantic similarity algorithm.

The study found a significant number of UNDECLARED patents are likely essential for 5G. They include well known companies such as Comcast, China Mobile, Coolpad, Acer, and many others. UC calls these submarine patents since FRAND may not apply to them based on some current court decisions. A table of some of these can be found in the chart below. The full article can be found here:

5G Submarine Patents