Nokia And Samsung Extend Patent Deal For Five Years

Patents are the bread-and-butter of the mobile market with many legal battles fought in court to secure and enforce them. Huge amounts of money change hands as technology company's license patents held by others. Nokia and Samsung have announced that they have extended their patent agreement adding another five years to the deal.

This patent agreement comes after Samsung allegedly viewed confidential documents outlining patent agreements between Nokia and Apple. So far, details of exactly what is covered in the patent deal are unknown. Nokia hasn't announced which patents are covered in the agreement or how much money has changed hands.

The original patent agreement between Nokia and Samsung was set to expire at the end of 2013. Nokia has stated that Samsung will pay "additional compensation" starting on January 1, 2014. The exact amount that Samsung will pay Nokia will be settled on using a binding arbitration process that could take a year and is expected to close by 2015.

Nokia has taken several of its large competitors the court over licensing for its standards essential patents. Companies that have been sued by Nokia include BlackBerry and HTC. HTC fought Nokia in court and lost with Nokia seeking to block the sale certain devices early on during the court battle.

SOURCE: ZDNet