Over the summer, Qualcomm had claimed that some of Meizu’s handsets infringed on the company’s patents, and they were looking to draw up lawsuits over these infringed patents. Meizu had announced that they were working with Qualcomm to create a license agreement between the two companies. Basically, they were looking to stay out of course. However that now appears to not be happening. As Qualcomm announced on Friday that they would be filing lawsuits against Meizu in three countries. These countries include France, Germany and the United States.
In a prepared statement, Don Rosenberg, Qualcomm’s executive vice president and general counsel stated that “Meizu’s refusal to negotiate a license agreement in good faith and its sales and distribution of infringing products around the world leave Qualcomm no choice but to protect our patent rights through these additional legal proceedings.” Qualcomm did indeed attempt to work with Meizu, but it’s unclear which side was uncooperative in putting forth a licensing deal between the two. Meizu has not responded to the lawsuit filings just yet, with this happening on Friday evening in the US, it’s likely that Meizu won’t announce anything until Monday morning in China (that would be Sunday night in the US).
Meizu hasn’t been a popular Qualcomm customer. In fact, they have mostly used MediaTek and Samsung’s Exynos chipsets in their smartphones. But Qualcomm claims that they infringe on a number of their 3G and 4G patents. Qualcomm does have a ton of patents to their name, after all they have been in the mobile business for quite some time, creating a slew of different processors, modems and many other components that are seen in most smartphones today. Hopefully Meizu and Qualcomm are able to settle their differences out of court. It’ll be cheaper for both sides, and much easier than paying their lawyers millions of dollars in the courtroom. It’s a bit interesting to see Meizu getting a lawsuit filed in the US, considering they don’t officially sell any of their smartphones here in the US. They are all imported and sold – and none of them support US wireless networks.
Update: Meizu has released a statement in regards to Qualcomm filing lawsuits against them in these three countries, stating:
“Meizu has worked with Qualcomm to advance towards an agreement. We respect Qualcomm’s right to use legal measures if they are unsatisfied with the progress, but still welcome them to proceed the negotiations with us at any time.”