There were high hopes that 4G would bring a whole new approach to patent licensing, replacing bilateral and secretive deals with pools or open frameworks.
Wimax has made some progress in this direction, but on the LTE side, the various pool proposals continue to wrangle while individual vendors put their old-style deals in place.
Qualcomm has extended agreements with four of the top five phonemakers to its 4G-related IPR, Ericsson claims a string of pacts, and now Nokia and Motorola have expanded their licensing deals to cover LTE, Wimax and LTE-Advanced.
True to the shadowy nature of traditional wireless licensing, the terms of the agreement were not disclosed, but at least the two handset vendors were not filing lawsuits, like many of their rivals - Apple is locked in legal combat with Nokia and HTC, Motorola with Microsoft, and Google with Oracle.
“This agreement shows that the industry is making fast progress in resolving LTE licensing issues between the major patent holders," said Paul Melin, VP of intellectual property at Nokia, in a statement.
His counterpart at Motorola Mobility, Kirk Dailey, said such pacts would “foster innovation.”
This article originally appeared in Rethink Wireless
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