Patent issues warrant attention.

A South Korean company called Mimir IP has sued the American memory manufacturer Micron Technology for patent infringement. The company has filed lawsuits with the International Trade Commission and the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Texas. The lawsuit also names Tesla, Dell, HP, and Lenovo, among other companies, as secondary defendants for using Micron components.

The Korea Economic Daily (KED) describes Mimir IP as a Non-Practicing Entity (NPE), commonly referred to as a patent troll. Mimir earns money by purchasing patents and then profiting by suing companies that use devices or technology covered by the patents.

In May alone, Mimir purchased approximately 1,500 patents from SK Hynix. The company immediately filed lawsuits, six of which involve "circuits, voltage measuring devices, and non-volatile storage devices." Although KED did not mention specific demands, it is estimated that if the court ultimately rules in favor of Mimir IP, the compensation amount could reach $480 million. The judge may also force the defendants to sign a licensing agreement with Mimir.

KED points out that companies often sell patents to patent trolls to fight competitors through proxy. Recently, the company has noticed an increase in NPE activity, which may be due to the ongoing boom in artificial intelligence. It can be said that the three major DRAM suppliers—Samsung, SK Hynix, and Micron—have all loaded NPE cannons last year.

Common phenomenon in the technology market: patent speculatorsNon-Practicing Entities (NPEs) do not engage in manufacturing or product sales, but obtain patent rights through independent research and development or patent transfers. They primarily use licensing negotiations and patent litigation to collect royalties or damages from companies engaged in production or manufacturing as their profit goal. Patent wars are a common business practice in Europe and America. However, because "patent trolls" do not manufacture patents themselves and do not provide patent services, they have a strong parasitic nature. As a result, the United States was the first to use terms like "patent trolls" and "patent cockroaches" to describe such companies in 1993. Companies like Intellectual Ventures, Interdigital, and Acacai have become notorious for this reason.

As awareness of patent protection gradually increases, patent trolls are becoming more professional. Many large technology companies have faced lawsuits from patent speculators. On February 15, 2024, Immersion, which focuses on haptic feedback technology, reached a settlement with Meta regarding patent litigation for the Quest VR headset. In a press release, Immersion stated that it had signed a licensing agreement with Meta to provide its patents to Meta and its affiliated companies for hardware, software, VR, and gaming products. However, the specific terms of the agreement were not disclosed. Immersion CEO Eric Singer said in a statement, "We are very pleased to grant Meta a license for our haptic feedback technology patents. We are very happy to be able to authorize Meta to provide high-quality haptic feedback on their devices."

Immersion, based in Aventura, Florida, was founded in 1993 and has always focused on haptic feedback. The company's first major customer was Microsoft. In 1999, after acquiring a haptic patent portfolio from small technology company Cybernet Systems, Immersion went public on the NASDAQ.

In the years following its initial public offering, Immersion earned the reputation of a "patent troll" by selectively merging and acquiring over 1,000 haptic feedback patents. As of 2014, Immersion had more than 1,650 published or pending patents in the United States and other countries (by the end of June 2022, this number had dropped to around 1,200 to 1,300).

In fact, Immersion has already sued almost all major technology companies in terms of patents. In the end, most of the targeted manufacturers choose to pay for Immersion's authorization.

In 2002, Immersion sued Microsoft and Sony, claiming that their game console controllers infringed on two of its patents. Both defendants eventually reached an agreement with Immersion. Sony was forced to pay $150 million, while Microsoft chose to buy 10% of Immersion's shares and a perpetual license.

In 2016, Immersion claimed that Apple's iPhone 6s and Apple Watch infringed on two of their patents. In May 2023, Immersion sued Valve, accusing it of infringing their patents in the SteamDeck and Valve Index VR headset.

Not long ago, Xiaomi also encountered patent litigation. Sun Patent Trust, a patent trust, filed lawsuits against Xiaomi in France and India, claiming that Xiaomi infringed on its LTE-A technology-related standard essential patents (SEPs). It is reported that in this lawsuit, Sun Patent Trust requested the Tribunal Judiciaire de Paris in France to determine the global FRAND license fee rate for its patents involved in the case and may start or plan parallel litigation in other jurisdictions.

Dutch media SmartphoneMagazine reported that Sun Patent Trust's claim could reach as high as $300 million. Behind this lawsuit is a covert war known as "patent privateering," which is not only related to Xiaomi's future but also reflects the complex game in the global intellectual property field.According to statistical data from the research firm Darts-Ip, in Europe, over the decade from 2007 to 2017, there has been a significant upward trend in the number of lawsuits involving "patent trolls," with an average annual growth rate of about 20%. Industry insiders have expressed concern, believing that such lawsuits not only hinder the normal conduct of innovative activities but also impose a heavy economic burden on companies, especially in dealing with high litigation costs.

To address this challenge, some large industrial companies, such as Google and Canon, have taken proactive actions by establishing a non-profit organization called LOT Network to strengthen cooperation and coordination among each other to jointly resist the risks brought by patent troll behavior. At the same time, the judiciary is also called upon to increase the supervision of patent privateering to maintain the healthy and orderly development of the industry.

In this covert war involving the high-tech field, how to balance the relationship between innovation protection and fair competition, to ensure that the results of innovation are reasonably protected while avoiding the abuse of patent rights to damage the fairness of market competition, has become an important issue that all stakeholders must think about and solve together.