Reuters: EU Commission plans to set rules for patent licensing in automotive industry as Nokia vs. Daimler legal battle escalates

The Finnish networks giant Nokia and German car maker Daimler have been going at each other in courts and via antitrust complaints for almost two years now. Nokia alleges that Daimler is using Nokia’s patents without permission and isn’t willing to negotiate a license, while Daimler claims Nokia is a abusing it’s patent position and refuses to license patents under FRAND (fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory) terms to the car maker’s suppliers.

Reuters reports that the EU Commission is preparing proposals under the Commission’s Intellectual Property Action Plan that will be presented on 24th November. The proposals include engaging with the automotive sector to figure out the best way of patent licensing. To regulate the IP licensing market the EU might set up a system of 3rd party essentiality checks, that should determine if the patents are “standard and essential”, thus also determining their value.

We should know more details about this next week when the Action Plan will go public.