Context: Last month, Nokia announced the third license agreement with an (unnamed) video streaming platform (LinkedIn post by Arvin Patel). But 15 months ago, its discussions with Amazon, whose Prime Video service is one of the leading streaming networks, had reached an impasse and Nokia brought patent infringement actions in the U.S., Germany, India, the UK and the Unified Patent Court (UPC) (October 31, 2023 corporate blog post by Nokia). Two different Administrative Law Judges (ALJs) of the United States International Trade Commission (USITC, or just ITC) held Amazon to infringe valid Nokia patents (January 30, 2025 ip fray article). A German court ordered an injunction against Amazon Prime Video (February 7, 2025 ip fray article). Amazon hoped to gain leverage from a U.S. countersuit (July 31, 2024 ip fray article) and placed a bet on UK judicial imperialism as a means of preventing Nokia from enforcing its intellectual property (February 2, 2025 ip fray article).
What’s new: Nokia has just announced “a patent agreement with Amazon covering the use of Nokia’s video technologies in Amazon’s streaming services and devices” and settling all litigation worldwide between the two companies. As usual, the terms are confidential.
Direct impact: This is Nokia’s first patent license deal with a major streaming platform, and the first case in which the other party is known. Nokia appears to be at the forefront of this emerging licensing market among large patent holders. This means the Amazon dispute is water under the bridge just in time for Nokia’s incoming CEO Justin Hotard (February 10, 2025 ip fray article) to take over.
Wider ramifications: Beyond the parties involved in this deal, the agreement is another sign that streaming services can’t freeride anymore. Smaller companies such as Adeia (December 3, 2024 ip fray article) and DivX have announced various license deals in that field, but Nokia’s peers and some major pool administrators have yet to do so. The situation in which Amazon settled with Nokia is reminiscent of its settlement with Huawei a year earlier (March 5, 2024 ip fray article), which also occurred after a German injunction took effect. This time around, developments at the ITC have presumably contributed to a comparable extent.
Not all video streaming services are operated by companies that also offer streaming hardware, but Amazon is one such vendor. For a long time, many major patent holders contented themselves with collecting (usually through pools) royalties on streaming devices, but that has changed. Earlier this year, Access Advance launched a video distribution pool (January 16, 2025 ip fray article). Just last week, consumer electronics manufacturer Vestel, which has been on the receiving end of various standard-essential patent (SEP) lawsuits, joined the Avanci Video platform as a licensor (March 28, 2025 ip fray article).
Courts can order injunctions against both streaming devices and streaming services, as the Landgericht München I (Munich I Regional Court) did in Nokia v. Amazon last fall. But those importing streaming devices into the U.S. are additionally at risk of limited exclusion orders (U.S. import bans) that the ITC can order. In the ITC, an ALJ agreed with Nokia on four out of five asserted patents in one case, and in another case, an ALJ agreed with Nokia on another patent. Amazon faced the clear and present danger of U.S. import bans over five patents.
What the Nokia-Amazon dispute showed is that Nokia not only has video-related SEPs subject to FRAND (fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory licensing) pledges, but also some powerful non-SEPs that are not subject to a FRAND commitment. Amazon tried to use the English courts, betting particularly on one judge who confuses his role for that of a worldwide patent lawmaker, to force Nokia to grant a license to non-SEPs that are routinely licensed along with SEPs. That question won’t be resolved now, but it was telling that Amazon itself didn’t really believe too much in that theory. Despite Amazon having abandoned that position, Lord Justice Arnold allowed them to pursue it on a “just in case it’s useful” basis.
Unlike Lenovo, which sought only a declaration that a willing licensor in Ericsson’s place would grant an interim license (which Ericsson is appealing (March 7, 2025 ip fray article), Amazon actually wanted the English courts to enter a specific-performance injunction that would have ordered Nokia to grant such a license. That would have been at odds with existing jurisprudence, and if it had happened, it would have made the UK a FRAND rogue state with major international repercussions. Thanks to the settlement, there is no more risk of the English courts making yet another outrageous decision in this particular dispute.
Nokia’s video codec innovation history (and future)
Nokia has been innovating in this field for a long time, and proudly points to five Technology & Engineering Emmy Awards that its engineers have won.
Nokia’s work in this field started with the H.264/Advanced Video Coding (AVC) standard in the early 2000s. The most recently adopted standard in that field is H.266/Versatile Video Coding (VVC). It was completed in 2020.
Last year Nokia filed over 140 video-related patent applications, more than 50% related to the proposed H.267 core codec, with additional filings in areas such as the complementary standard VSEI (Versatile Supplemental Ehancement Information) and MPEG (Motion Picture Expert Group) video standards.
Nokia also invented the technology that optimizes video content on a device screen when switching between portrait and landscape. Fast forwarding or rewinding a video by scrolling through it, while simultaneously displaying the current scene, was also invented by Nokia. As were certain technologies that enable the personalization of content recommendations.
Another Amazon SEP dispute in which the patentee was deemed perfectly FRAND-compliant
After Amazon settled with Huawei over WiFi 6 patents, a redacted version of a judgment became available and it showed that the Munich I Regional Court had actually considered Huawei overcompliant with its FRAND licensing obligations (March 19, 2024 ip fray article). In Nokia v. Amazon, there’s a similar pattern: U.S. trade judges and German judges found no fault in Nokia’s conduct (in fact, they deemed Nokia to have acted in good faith and saw indications of its license fees being accepted by the market), though there was some skepticism as to whether Amazon was a willing licensee.
Just last week, we reported on the views expressed by the ITC’s Office of Unfair Import Investigations (OUII, commonly referred to as the “ITC Staff”) (March 25, 2025 ip fray article). The OUII participates in select ITC proceedings as a neutral third party.
Encoding vs. decoding: only the latter is subject to FRAND
One of the key holdings in this dispute was that only decoding (but not encoding) patent claims are subject to the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) FRAND pledge. That question is sure to come up in more streaming SEP disputes.
Similarly significant is the clear rejection of pool licenses covering other patents as comparable business terms for the purposes of valuing bilateral licenses.
Continuity of Nokia’s licensing efforts
Nokia has recently promoted Patrik Hammarén to President of Nokia Technologies (January 22, 2025 ip fray article). Tomorrow, the Nokia group’s new CEO will have his official start. None of that appears to slow down the company’s licensing efforts.
The multimedia program is still managed by Arvin Patel, the company’s Chief Licensing Officer for New Segments. The press release quotes him as follows:
“We are pleased to have reached agreement on the use of Nokia’s video technologies in Amazon’s streaming services and devices.”
Mr. Hammarén persuaded Susanna Martikainen, a Nokia licensing executive, to take the lead on wireless (also including IoT) licensing, ensuring continuity in that field as well (LinkedIn post by Mrs. Martikainen).
Today’s announcement is Nokia’s most significant settlement of a patent dispute since the one with Mercedes (named Daimler at the time), but we expect a steady stream of licensing announcements by Nokia, in wireless and in multimedia, with and (in the vast majority of cases) without prior litigation.