Dolby International AB, GE Video Compression, LLC, and Koninklijke Philips NV v. MAS Elektronik Aktiengesellschaft

In patent infringement litigation matters before Germany’s Düsseldorf District Court concerning patents essential to the H.265 (high efficiency video coding, or HEVC) video codec standard licensed through the HEVC Advance patent pool, Analysis Group Managing Principal John Jarosz provided expert testimony on behalf of several of HEVC Advance’s licensors: Dolby International AB (Dolby), GE Video Compression, LLC (GE), and Koninklijke Philips NV (Philips).

Dolby, GE, and Philips claimed that by practicing the H.265 technology standard in certain of its products, namely televisions, set-top boxes, and tablets, MAS Elektronik AG (MAS) had infringed patents that they contributed to the H.265 patent pool administered by HEVC Advance. MAS responded that the royalties charged by the HEVC Advance patent pool were not fair, reasonable, and non-discriminatory (FRAND).

An expert retained on behalf of MAS opined before the Düsseldorf District Court that HEVC Advance’s licensing terms violated the FRAND conditions in a number of ways. In expert testimony supported by a team including Vice President Shogo Hamasaki, Mr. Jarosz rebutted the statements of MAS’s expert by analyzing, among other things, marketplace licenses, adoption, and competition for video codec technologies, opining that HEVC Advance’s licensing terms were “fair and reasonable.” In its written decisions, the court ruled that HEVC Advance’s licensing terms were FRAND.