On April 6, the Huawei Voice Community released the minutes of the "Patent Licensing Business Report", and Huawei plans to establish a price benchmark on self-developed patents. The minutes of the meeting were issued by Ren Zhengfei, the helmsman of Huawei, and it is also the first time that Huawei has publicly stated its position on the price of 5G patent fees.
Screenshot of Huawei Voices community website
What did Huawei say in the file?
According to the documents, first, Huawei should continue to protect research and innovation achievements and actively build high-value patent packages around the world; second, Huawei should continue to play the role of patent protection companies in global business security; third, Huawei should lay the image of Huawei innovators through reasonable fees; fourth, Huawei should cooperate by building partners, selecting patent pools, and patent operating companies.
Huawei said in the document that in the past, Huawei's intellectual property rights were for self-defense and efforts to ensure the security of its business. Through so many years of accumulation, Huawei has formed high-value patent packages in several major fields such as 5G, WiFi6, audio and video codec, optical transmission, and optical intelligence, and has a certain right to speak.
"We want to build a reasonable price benchmark, so that the industry can use our patented technology fairly and reasonably, and at the same time obtain appropriate returns on research and development, it will also help us to establish an image of innovators in the international community; we use other people's patents and pay reasonably, so as to establish intellectual property values and soil that are conducive to innovation in the world."
Huawei: Patent fees are a "protracted battle", and the fees cannot be too low
"Patent fees cannot be charged for the sake of charging; nor can they be too low, they must be too low, which will curb the innovation of the whole society, and no one is willing to invest in research and development anymore, which will form our de facto monopoly and do not meet the principle of fairness, reasonableness and non-discrimination required by law." People who invest in research and development expect that the income will be a little more than the investment, and there will be many failures in research and development, and the cost of failure should also be included in the cost, so that everyone will be willing to continue to invest in deep research and development and form a positive cycle. Huawei said.
Huawei stressed that in terms of patent fees, Huawei should also be prepared to fight a "protracted war", not seeking quick victory, not afraid of defeat, and collecting more and less is a success. But charging is not the ultimate goal, the most important thing is to sort out the relationship between the two sides through communication and negotiation. In the process of negotiation, a team that is good at communication and negotiation is gradually forged. When Huawei comes to the world's leading position one day, it can rationally allocate the value chain.
In this document, Huawei proposed to encourage employees to read more patents and disclose their experiences, leading Huawei's R&D personnel to find tips from them.
Huawei Voices Community Review
"We are not trying to infringe on other people's patents, but to stand on the shoulders of giants. Theory is open in the world, and technological innovation can only be developed on the basis of open sharing, mutual learning, and mutual respect (transaction). We need to make the best products in the world based on available licenses and patent rules, not to work hard without understanding the innovations that others already have, and not to take detours to produce more consumption. Huawei stressed.
Explore patent licensing models and promotion mechanisms
In view of the fact that Huawei has accumulated a large number of patents, including some technical secrets that are not suitable for disclosure, and have not been used by Huawei for production and sales, generating commercial value, Huawei intends to actively explore the technical secret licensing model and industrial promotion mechanism, and authorize external manufacturers to exert their commercial value.
Huawei said that it should formulate intellectual property protection strategies with the times, and explore and think about licensing models and promotion mechanisms for technical secrets. In particular, some technical secret achievements, we do not produce and sell related products, may be "shelved", resulting in waste, but also not conducive to the prosperity of the industrial chain, and ultimately affect our own development.
"We should explore the appropriate licensing model and promotion mechanism, authorize external manufacturers, solve the problem of industrial competitiveness, and exert its commercial value." Huawei said.
In other words, Huawei is ready to start monetizing more accumulated patents, which is conducive to both the value of patents and the development of the industrial chain.
Collecting 5G Patent Fees: An Important Signal for Huawei's Transformation?
In 2017, Ericsson announced the standard for collecting 5G patent fees, and the 5G patent licensing fee for high-end handheld devices was 5 US dollars per unit, and the low-end handheld device licensing fee was 2.5 US dollars per unit; while Nokia announced the 5G patent fee rate was up to 3 euros per unit.
In 2018, Qualcomm disclosed for the first time the licensing of 5G patents and the charging standards. A 5G mobile phone of about 4,000 yuan may have patent fees as high as hundreds of yuan, and the maximum charge is $400.
In 2021, Huawei officially began to implement 5G patent licensing fees. Last year, Huawei's consumer business revenue fell sharply, but the "revenue" brought by patent fees greatly increased profits and gross profit margins. Huawei said it received a $600 million (about 3.89 billion yuan) in patent royalties in the first quarter of 2021, which is one of the reasons for the increase in its net profit in the first quarter.
Ding Jianxin, director of Huawei's Intellectual Property Department, has revealed that Huawei's intellectual property revenue in the three years from 2019 to 2021 totaled 1.2 billion to 1.3 billion US dollars. He said that according to the reasonable percentage rate of the price of 5G mobile phones, Huawei's charging standard for 5G multi-mode mobile phones is capped at a single license fee of $2.50.
It is worth noting that Huawei is a major contributor to global 5G patents and also holds a large number of 5G basic patents. From this perspective, major domestic smartphone brands or enterprises, including Lenovo, ZTE, Xiaomi, Meizu, OPPO and vivo, may become the main body that needs to pay patent licensing fees to Huawei. With the rapid development of 5G, the future involves more and more 5G technology, patented terminals, if Huawei charges patent fees for all 5G terminals, then Huawei's income from intellectual property rights may not be small.
For the collection of patent fees, Ren Zhengfei had a humorous statement in June 2019: "We are too busy, the development is too fast, there is no time to collect patent fees, when we are not busy, when we are idle, even if we want patent fees, we will not want as much as Qualcomm." ”
Nowadays, with the supply of Huawei's high-end chips and the separation of mobile phone business, it may be the time when Ren Zhengfei said that he is "not busy". Huawei's release of the document may be a signal for Huawei to survive, an important signal for Huawei's transformation, and also a manifestation of Chinese enterprises' participation in international market competition.
Huawei has a huge patent advantage
On March 16 last year, Huawei released the Innovation and Intellectual Property White Paper 2020. The white paper points out that by the end of 2021, Huawei has more than 45,000 valid authorized patents (more than 110,000) worldwide, and more than 90% of the patents are invention patents.
In 2021, after 2019, Huawei won the first place in the number of applications from the European Patent Office. Statistics from the European Patent Office show that Huawei topped the list of the number of patent applications filed by EPO companies in 2021, with a total of 3544 patents filed, ahead of South Korea's Samsung and LG.
European Patent Office 2021 data
It is understood that in the past 20 years, Huawei has conducted extensive cross-licensing negotiations with major patent holders in the ICT industry, and has signed more than 100 patent licensing and cross-licensing agreements with major ICT manufacturers such as the United States, Europe, Japan and South Korea.
Huawei can be far ahead in terms of patent applications, lies in its long-term insistence on huge investment in technology research and development, in 2021, although its revenue fell by more than 200 billion yuan, but it still invested more than 100 billion yuan in technology research and development, the amount of investment was as high as 142.7 billion yuan, and the data in 2021 showed that Huawei's technology research and development investment ranked third in the world, ahead of Samsung and Apple.
Huawei has long ranked first in technology research and development, and the 2021 domestic enterprise R&D investment ranking data shows that Huawei's R&D investment ranks first, and its technology R&D investment is 2.4 times that of the second place and 3.6 times that of the third place.
Huawei competes for the initiative in 6G technology
6G is expected to achieve high-speed communications more than 10 times that of 5G, and it is expected to be commercialized around 2030.
Around the standard of the new generation of high-speed communication 6G, China and the United States have launched a leading right competition in patents. Analysis of the number of patent applications for core technologies found that China accounts for 40% of the total, in a leading position. But the United States, which accounts for 35 percent, is also on par with China.
Source: Nikkei Chinese Network
In nine fields, including communication technology, base station technology, and artificial intelligence (AI), more than 20,000 patents registered and pending in Japan, the United States, Europe, China, and South Korea, as well as international applications, were analyzed by country and region. The number of patents by Chinese enterprises reached 40.3% of the total.
In terms of fields, China has advantages in infrastructure areas such as base stations and artificial satellites, while the United States has advantages in the field of software. In the field of basic technologies, Chinese companies such as the State Grid account for more than half of the top 20.
From the perspective of base station technology, Qualcomm of the United States, Ericsson of Sweden, and Huawei of China are in the forefront. In the field of AI, VR and other software technologies, Microsoft and Intel in the United States are in the forefront.
According to the Nikkei Chinese Network, some analysts believe that the more they have a large number of related patents, the more they can occupy an advantage in the formulation of standards. Ren Zhengfei said at an internal meeting in August 2021 that if he did not control the patent, he would be forced (to use) by others. Huawei's meeting minutes made public on September 15, 2021 revealed that Ren Zhengfei asked for a 6G patent.
Huawei actively deploys the semiconductor field
In addition to Huawei has a large number of patents in the field of communications, in the past two years, Huawei's Hubble has also invested in a large number of semiconductor-related enterprises, and Huawei has also disclosed semiconductor chip-related patents many times.
In addition to Huawei's large number of patents in the field of communications, in recent years, Huawei's Hubble has also invested in a large number of semiconductor-related companies. According to incomplete statistics, in recent years, Huawei has also disclosed patents related to semiconductor chips many times.
Huawei discloses patents related to chip stacking packaging
According to the Tianyancha App, on April 5, Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. announced a patent for "a chip stacking packaging and terminal equipment". The abstract shows that the present disclosure relates to the field of semiconductor technology, which can ensure the demand for power supply while solving the problem of high cost caused by the use of silicon through-hole technology. It is understood that this may be a chip stacking technology developed by Huawei. This technology can be exchanged for higher performance by increasing the area and stacking, so as to achieve a low-process process to catch up with the competitiveness of high-performance chips.
Huawei publishes patents related to "semiconductor devices"
According to the Tianyancha App, on June 29, 2021, Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. published a patent for "semiconductor devices and related modules, circuits, and preparation methods", publication number CN113054010A, and the application date is February 2021. The patent abstract shows that the device includes: N-type drift layer, P-type base layer, N-type emitter layer, gate, field-cut layer, and P-type collector layer. The above semiconductor devices can effectively reduce the leakage current between the collector and emitter of IGBT.
Huawei publishes a patent for an optical chip
According to the Tianyancha App, on April 8, 2021, Huawei published an invention patent called "Optical Chip for Coupled Light and Its Manufacturing Method". The patent abstract shows that the present invention provides an optical chip for coupling light between the optical chip and another optical device.
Huawei publishes a patent related to optical computing chips
According to the Tianyancha App, on February 2, 2021, Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. published an invention patent for "optical computing chip, system, and data processing technology" with the publication number CN112306145A, and the application date was August 2019. The patent abstract shows an optical computing chip, system and data processing technology.
In general, Huawei's advantages in patents are obvious, but the transformation of a large number of Huawei patents in revenue has yet to be realized.
According to the analysis of Securities Times, "As a benchmark enterprise in China, Huawei's playing style and strategy in the field of patent licensing operation will have important reference significance for other domestic enterprises that have applied for a large number of high-value patents." ”
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