Huawei and MediaTek talks collapsed, who is the "patent thief"?
Some friends should still have the impression that in July this year, Huawei sued MediaTek in China, saying that MediaTek infringed Huawei's technology patents and used a series of patented technologies such as Huawei's 5G, 4G, and 3G without paying Huawei. And MediaTek did not admit it, and after being sued by Huawei, MediaTek also sued Huawei, saying that Huawei infringed MediaTek's patented technology.
There is an interesting detail here, that is, Huawei is suing MediaTek in China, and MediaTek is suing Huawei in the United Kingdom, as for why it is done, the reason is also very simple, both sides want to find their own advantage area to defend their rights.
However, at that time, the lawsuit was not actually launched, and the two sides had actually been negotiating privately, and recently, some foreign media reported that Huawei and MediaTek had collapsed, and the two sides did not reach an agreement on patent infringement, and the two sides may have to formally go to court later.
Huawei sued MediaTek for infringing its own patents, and MediaTek said that Huawei infringed its own patents, so who is the "patent thief"? Truth be told, from past experience, there is no standard answer to this question. In fact, there have been many examples of mutual prosecution between chip giants and communication giants over the years, Apple has sued Qualcomm, Samsung, Qualcomm has also sued Apple, Samsung and Huawei, Huawei has also sued these companies, as for the final result, it is basically a mutual victory and defeat, and there is no situation where one of them is really innocent.
Therefore, this patent lawsuit between MediaTek and Huawei, even if it really starts, it should end in a settlement, the difference is just to see who loses a little more, and then give the other party some compensation. However, in my opinion, this patent dispute between Huawei and MediaTek is indeed a milestone. Why? This is because, what Huawei wants to do this time is to change the established rules of the entire industry in the past, in the past in the 2, 3, and 4G eras, companies with technology patents will find mobile phone manufacturers to collect patent fees, such as Qualcomm will find Xiaomi, Samsung, Apple to collect patent fees, but in fact, this model is more troublesome.
Many people may not understand that many patented technologies used in mobile phones are integrated into the chip, so from the perspective of the convenience of patent fee collection, enterprises with patented technology directly charge patent royalties to chip manufacturers, which is relatively easier and more convenient.
However, although this model seems to be relatively more reasonable to the outside world, it is obviously not cost-effective for chip companies, and it will also pay a fee in advance, if you add unsalable chips, the loss may be greater, so MediaTek does not agree with Huawei's plan, which is why there is now a patent dispute.
In my opinion, if Huawei can defeat MediaTek through litigation this time, the industry rules pursued in the past may be changed, which is actually a good thing for the entire industry.
After all, to put it bluntly, enterprises with patented technology charge patent fees to mobile phone manufacturers, relatively speaking, it is indeed more troublesome, and mobile phone manufacturers will definitely not particularly cooperate, plus there are many mobile phone brands on the market, it is really necessary to collect them one by one, the difficulty is definitely not small, and if it can be collected directly from the source, it will be a good signal for many enterprises that research technology, and the enthusiasm for technology research and development of the entire industry will also be stimulated, and it will be absolutely good in the long run.
In short, from the perspective of industry development, I very much hope that Huawei can win the lawsuit.