A long-running patent dispute between Apple and mobile comms pioneer Ericsson dating has been settled, said the Swedish company, announcing that a license deal for its 2G, 3G and 4G/LTE patents had been reached. The amount Apple agreed to pay for use of the patented technology has not been disclosed, but Reuters cited an estimate in an investment note from a Nordic bank.
Investment bank ABG Sundal Collier said in a note to clients it believed the deal meant Apple would be charged around 0.5 percent of its revenue on iPads and iPhones by Ericsson.
The two companies have been in dispute since 2012. Apple took Ericsson to court back in January, claiming that the company was asking too much money for a license, and Ericsson countersued shortly afterwards.
The Swedish company upped the stakes in February, asking the ITC to block iPhones from the USA. The ITC agreed to investigate, but did not impose an import ban. Ericsson’s next move was to sue Apple in Europe, but it appears that the two companies have now settled their differences.
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Here’s the funny bit: This royalty may be lower than Apple had previously been paying Ericsson.
That’s why Apple took Ericsson to court to begin with.
in fact, Apple would pay more than Ericsson initially wanted. They wanted 250-750 million dollars per year. By making a simple math, it looks like Apple would pay 775.2 million dollars just from the iPhone sales during FY2015. Not counting LTE iPads since Apple doesn’t show exact figures to specific models.
Where did you get that number from?
IIRC, Ericsson was basing it on number of sales from 2012 when they initially sued IIRC. So if the numbers you’re using is 2015, which is a massive jump in sales compared to 2012, it is actually much less, not more.
I used numbers from 2015 since the word was originally about Apple paying per year. Thus, making it 775 for 2015, less for previous years