Hytera was banned from global sales of two-way radio technology products and fined by a U.S. court for a patent dispute with Motorola. In fact, this dispute has been going on for a long time, as early as 2017, Motorola sued Hytera, after seven years of "entanglement", it seems that the dispute between the two sides is coming to an end, but this incident once again pushed Hytera to the forefront.
In its 2023 semi-annual report, Hytera clearly pointed out that the company and its main competitor Motorola have a series of patent infringement disputes, trade secret and copyright infringement disputes, antitrust and other litigation matters around the world. The scope of products banned by Hytera this time is obviously beyond the scope of the litigation between the two parties, which undoubtedly brings great pressure and challenges to Hytera.
Faced with such a situation, Hytera immediately withdrew the lawsuit in Shenzhen in accordance with the requirements of the US court, suspended the sale of two-way radio technology products, and applied to the US court to revoke the above order. The company said it will take further countermeasures to revoke the order in the shortest possible time. However, if it cannot be resolved for a long time, it may affect the company's production and operation.
Hytera's overseas sales account for nearly half of its total revenue, and the importance of overseas markets to Hytera is self-evident. However, the ban has undoubtedly had a huge impact on Hytera's overseas business. On the other hand, Hytera's traditional products involved in litigation have basically been discontinued, and the H series products are fully replacing the previous generation of products, and are not affected by the lawsuit, and have been fully promoted and highly recognized by the market around the world, but they are also included in the scope of the prohibition order. Although this is a positive sign for Hytera, it seems that the new series of products has suffered a bit of a "disaster".
From a legal point of view, the ban covers all products with two-way radio technology, and in fact goes beyond the scope of the lawsuit between Hytera and Motorola. The original intention of Hytera's lawsuit in Shenzhen is also to reaffirm the non-infringement of H series products from a legal point of view, which is a litigation strategy. However, the U.S. court's decision has put Hytera in a difficult position.
For Hytera, how to deal with similar patent litigation and market competition is an important topic for its future development. On the one hand, Hytera needs to strengthen its own technology research and development capabilities to avoid being controlled by others on patent issues, and on the other hand, Hytera also needs to seek more partners to reduce the occurrence of patent disputes through cooperation and sharing.
In general, although the challenges faced by Hytera are severe, opportunities and challenges coexist. As long as Hytera can properly handle this crisis, strengthen its own technology research and development capabilities, and seek more partners, it is possible to find new development opportunities in the crisis.