Context:
- Dispute: On Saturday, Nokia announced infringement lawsuits against Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) in the United States District Court for the District of Delaware, the Unified Patent Court (UPC), Germany, and Brazil (November 1, 2025 ip fray article). In Brazil, Nokia won the race to the courthouse by 66 seconds (November 2, 2025 ip fray article).
- Antisuit wars: In a different dispute over video patent licensing, where there is no known enforcement action yet, InterDigital obtained anti-interim-license injunctions (AILIs) from the UPC’s Mannheim Local Division (LD) and the Landgericht MĂĽnchen I (Munich I Regional Court, in response to which Amazon secured what is styled as an anti-antisuit injunction (AASI) from the High Court of Justice for England & Wales (EWHC). The exact breadth of the AILIs as well as of the UK AASI is not clear yet (October 22, 2025 ip fray article). The England & Wales Court of Appeal (EWCA), however, made a step in the direction of potential de-escalation last week when ZTE became the first SEP holder to win an interim-license appeal (October 31, 2025 ip fray article). But there is no UK appellate decision on anti-antisuit relief in this context yet, and Mr Justice Meade decided to leave his Amazon v. InterDigital injunction in force (October 30, 2025 ip fray article).
What’s new: It turns out that WBD also ran to the EWHC on Saturday to seek a global FRAND (fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory licensing) determination in the UK. On Monday (November 3, 2025), Mr Justice Mellor granted an ex parte preliminary injunction (PI) described as an AASI and related relief (AAAASI) against Nokia. The injunction is worded to prohibit Nokia from taking any steps in any court or tribunal (wherever situated) to seek any orders, measures or other relief (including, without limitation, antisuit relief) which would directly or indirectly, prevent WBD from pursuing or enforcing a UK FRAND determination or any part thereof, or an adjustable interim license. The most disconcerting part is that WBD wants to obligate Nokia to grant a license on UK-determined terms even to patents that are indisputably non-SEPs (only because they are part of Nokia’s video patent portfolio), a position taken by Amazon before and supported by Lord Justice Arnold (February 2, 2025 ip fray article).
Direct impact: The order notes that it is unclear whether Nokia already previously sought injunctive relief against such actions by WBD in another jurisdiction. Given that this decision came down ex parte, Nokia is entitled to a hearing. It can then appeal. Given the outcome in Samsung v. ZTE, it is possible that the EWCA will continue to de-escalate and, therefore, overrule Mr Justice Mellor again.
Wider ramifications:
- At the end of next week (November 14, 2025, the UPC’s Mannheim LD will hear Amazon’s objection to InterDigital’s ex parte AILI. This latest UK decision, while involving two different parties, will be taken note of by the UPC.
- Given the aggressive stance of the UK judiciary, the judges of the UPC should present a united front as long as the UPC’s Court of Appeal (CoA) has not resolved the question of how to deal with the UK’s jurisdictional imperialism.
- As ip fray suggested before, the only definitive way to neutralize the UK as a wannabe global FRAND forum would be to pre-empt an expedited UK FRAND determination and any coercive measures by lowering the merits standard in light of the threat of irreparable harm to right holders, and to enter (possibly even ex parte) infringement injunctions. In connection with patents that are not subject to a FRAND licensing obligation, unwillingness is not even necessary, but the pursuit of foreign antisuit injunctions can suffice to establish unwillingness. In any event, the threat of irreparable harm to intellectual property right holders from territorial overreach by a rogue jurisdiction could be given so much weight that even a prime facie showing of an infringement (comparable to the standard applied to urgency-based patent PIs in Brazil) would be sufficient to enjoin an implementer. Patent PIs would end those disputes quickly.
- The European Commission could bring a World Trade Organization (WTO) complaint over the UK judiciary’s encroachment on foreign jurisdictions.
A Nokia spokesperson provided the following comment:
“Nokia was made aware of injunction against it on Monday afternoon, which was made following a private hearing before Mr Justice Mellor on Monday 3 November 2025. Nokia received no notice of that hearing and was not represented. Nokia is reviewing the order and newly published judgment and reserves all its rights.”
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Counsel
WBD is being represented by Taylor Wessing, with the decision effectively applauding Michael Washbrook for his detailed account of interim-license and anti-antisuit case law. Taylor Wessing instructed Daniel Piccinin KC and Femi Adekoya.
In the UPC and Germany, WBD appears to be represented by Freshfields given the submission of an affidavit to the UK court by Wolrad Prinz zu Waldeck and Pyrmont. He frequently represents implementers. For example, he was Lenovo’s lead counsel in the German part of its dispute with Nokia.
Nokia’s UPC and German law firm, Arnold Ruess, has more AASI experience than any other. The Arnold Ruess team litigation against WBD consists of  Cordula Schumacher, Dr. Arno Risse (“RiĂźe” in German), Tim Smentkowski, Jan Wergin, Tuğçe Altun, and Victoria Thuesing (“ThĂĽsing” in German). For a non-exhaustive list of Arnold Ruess’s achievements, see the firm’s ip fray profile.
The decision mentions that Bird & Bird typically represents Nokia in the UK parts of such disputes. Richard Vary, who used to lead Nokia’s inhouse litigation department, is typically lead counsel. He and his team also represent InterDigital.