ZTE has joined the Avanci Alliance, a one-stop-shop IoT technology patent licensing marketplace.
Avaci offers IoT companies a single license for standard-essential patents on FRAND terms, eliminating the need to sign individual licensing agreements.
Licensees will be charged a flat per-device rate that will vary based on the value the patents add to the device in question.
The alliance is concentrating its initial licensing efforts on 2G, 3G and 4G technologies for connected cars and smart meters, and plans to quickly expand to other IoT product areas.
Avanci was formed in April and launched its licensing platform earlier this month. Founding members included Ericsson, Qualcomm, InterDigital and KPN.
“Avanci will enable IoT manufacturers to conveniently get the world’s most advanced wireless technologies, so they can scale quickly, shift more focus to marketing new IoT products, and, finally to accelerate the development of IoT globally.” ZTE chief intellectual property officer Spencer Shen said.
ZTE holds around 815 standards-essential LTE patents, more than 13% of the global total, and was recently named one of the top three holders of IoT patents.
The company said it has also submitted nearly 1,000 patent applications involving key 5G technologies.