Nokia sues Paramount for infringement on its encoding and decoding patents
Nokia has initiated patent infringement proceedings against Paramount at the Mannheim Local Division of the Unified Patent Court. Nokia enforces its European Patent EP4250732, which covers technology related to video encoding.
Video encoding and decoding are key technologies for streaming content online. Encoding transforms raw video footage into a manageable file size and format, making it suitable for transmission. This process significantly reduces bandwidth usage, which is crucial as the available internet bandwidth otherwise would be insufficient to support widespread, high-quality streaming services to end-users. Decoding decompresses the encoded video files, enabling them to be properly played back on the end-user devices.
The patent infringement proceedings before the UPC relate to other legal actions Nokia has initiated globally. Following failed licensing negotiations, Nokia has already started similar proceedings concerning the same technology in the United States and Brazil, as previously reported by Reuters.
According to Nokia’s statement reported by IP Fray, streaming services from company’s such as Paramount ‘would not work the way that consumers have come to expect’ without Nokia’s patented technology. Nokia wishes that Paramount pays for using Nokia’s technology and states that received compensation will be invested in further development.
In Europe, it is not yet been determined whether patents related to encoding technology qualify as standard-essential patents. However, it may be that the European courts will follow the opinion of the American Trade Commission (ITC), which has decided that encoding technology is not standard-essential.
In the past, Nokia has also initiated proceedings against other streaming services. For example, as part of its broader patent litigation, it filed infringement proceedings against Amazon before the UPC, alleging that Amazon infringed its video coding patent EP 2 661 892. According to Juve Patent, this ongoing dispute ended with both parties reaching a settlement.
Nokia is not the only company challenging streaming platforms. Juve Patent also reported that DivX has recently filed new UPC proceedings against Netflix, as the globally known streaming service refuses to obtain a license.
It will be interesting to see whether this current UPC case sets a precedent in Europe for future cases involving coding technology.
