Amazon Fire TV Sticks: Nokia patent is violated

Nokia may have long since abandoned its mobile phone division. However, the Finnish company, which is still active in the networking sector, has an enormous portfolio of patents. And Nokia is not afraid to examine other manufacturers’ products to see whether they infringe on any of these patents.

In October last year, Nokia’s lawyers filed a lawsuit against Amazon in the Munich district court because they believed that the patent EP2375749 had been infringed. This describes technologies for streaming videos encoded in H.264 and H.265 format. The judges agreed with the Finns’ assessment. They also believed that the protective letters held by the Nokia Group for Amazon’s streaming devices, primarily the Fire TV sticks, had been permanently infringed.

Nokia can stop sales of Fire TV sticks

Amazon now has the opportunity to appeal against the ruling. This led to a new hearing at the next higher court. The blog IP Fray, which specializes in patent issues, points out that the judges were largely unanimous in their decision. After the appeal period has expired, however, Nokia can tighten the screws even further and prohibit the sale of the affected devices in Germany.

Amazon said it had already shown itself willing to talk beforehand. However, the Americans felt that the license fees demanded were too high. They wanted to achieve FRAND licensing. This means that every interested party must be granted a license under fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory conditions.

However, during the course of the hearing, the judges at the regional court seemed to come to the conclusion that Amazon was lacking the necessary seriousness in the negotiations. Nokia is said to have met its licensing obligations. With the ruling now issued, the network specialist can count on greater concessions in the next round of negotiations if the interested parties are not to look for alternatives. In addition to Amazon, HP will have followed the process very closely. In November, the manufacturer of printers, PCs and notebooks will also appear before the Munich court and will have to defend itself against the same accusation.