Founded in 2009, Reolink is a Chinese manufacturer of security cameras and smart home technology. This market is rapidly expanding and is one of the smaller IoT verticals that is increasingly in the peripheral vision of SEP owners and patent pools (ie. those that license out HEVC and VVC patents).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Currently, HEVC and VVC are typically licensed only for end devices. For example, Via Licensing licenses HEVC to \u201cHEVC Products Sold to End Users\u201d, while Access Advance licenses to three categories of products: mobile devices (including tablets and laptops), connected home devices (covering everything from set-top-boxes, game consoles to security cameras) and 4K UHD TVs (including projectors and VR\/AR sets).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Reolink\u2019s General Counsel and Director of IP and Legal Affairs Dongfang Shan heads up a small team of 18 attorneys, 10 of which are dedicated to patents. Together, they manage a portfolio of roughly 200 patents, most of which are filed in China, Europe and the U.S., and cover security camera and doorbell technologies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Mr. Shan first joined Reolink in November 2023 after working a short stint as General Counsel at vehicle diagnostics firm Autel Intelligent Technology Corp. and eight years at Huawei. At the latter, Mr. Shan started as a patent prosecutor, before working his way up to computing device portfolio manager and then principal IP counsel, during which he signed off on several major licensing transactions involving 5G and Wi-Fi technologies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
ip fray<\/strong> sat down with Mr. Shan to discuss how he has started implementing his learnings from Huawei at Reolink (a comparably much smaller company), how he believes instilling confidence in his subordinates leads to successful leadership, and the challenges of switching from the licensor to the licensee side of the negotiation table.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mr. Shan heads both the legal team and the IP team and reports directly to the founder and CEO. His main tasks since being appointed have entailed building a stronger patent portfolio, ensuring the company succeeds in several pending matters it has been involved in, and training the R&D team so it better understands the concept of IP.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cBefore I joined, the R&D folk didn\u2019t have much IP-related experience and were not empowered to give ideas to address IP issues,\u201d he says. \u201cCompared with Huawei \u2013 which is very mature \u2013 Reolink still has a lot to enhance with regards to IP. One of my rules is encouraging the R&D members to understand IP and its importance.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The company has also significantly stepped up its filing since Mr. Shan came on board. Last year, it filed three times the patents it filed in 2023.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Taking on all of these new issues has been a welcome challenge for Mr. Shan, who spent years working his way up Huawei\u2019s IP ranks and left after signing off on its first 5G and Wi-Fi 6 agreements, including co-setting the royalty rates of the portfolios. \u201cThose, alongside helping to settle Huawei\u2019s litigation against IPB \u2013 brought by Japanese patent fund operator IP Bridge \u2013 were probably among my biggest career highlights,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe diversity of my experience \u2013 from prosecuting to managing portfolios to handling licensing programmes and steering litigation \u2013 has really eased me into this head role at Reolink,\u201d Mr. Shan adds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But, he emphasizes, in addition to Huawei\u2019s current IP head Alan Fan, who recruited Mr. Shan from university, there are three individuals in particular who have influenced and inspired him the most:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mr. Shan believes \u201cconfidence is everything\u201d and he applies everything that was encouraged of him to his own teams:<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI truly learned a lot from this style \u2013 it helped me to break my boundaries. So when I am leading, I also encourage my team members to break their boundaries. Even if they don\u2019t have licensing or litigation experience I tell them to go for it and say: \u2018I am there, together with you.\u2019 Of course, if the negotiation goes south then I will step in \u2013 but I will always encourage them to take the lead. This is my leadership philosophy.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n But applying experience from a major, global licensor to a comparably smaller implementer only goes so far. Reolink is still very much on the licensee side of the table, and that means two things:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Reolink has joined Via LA\u2019s HEVC patent pool as a licensee. When asked about whether it will join other pools, Mr. Shan says:<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cReolink always respects the IPRs of others and is committed to fostering a culture of innovation and fair competition. We demonstrated this commitment by entering into a lot of license agreements with other vendors. However, Reolink also believes respect for IPRs must be grounded in fairness, so we do not accept or engage in arrangements which are unjust or unreasonable.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Business on the product side is good \u2013 Reolink focuses on mid-to-high-end products and targets markets in Europe and the U.S., according to Mr. Shan. \u201cIf your prices are higher then it is usually not good for you in terms of competition in the Chinese market,\u201d he explains. But, where Reolink is active, the market is still growing and competition isn\u2019t too fierce yet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When asked about the U.S. tariffs, Mr. Shan also seems relaxed:<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIt certainly would squeeze the profit margins a bit but as long as we keep our product competitive on the tech side then we will be on a level playing field.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Long-term, the IP head wants to build out his team significantly \u2013 \u201chopefully they would be better than me in the IP field someday\u201d. And, he says, to get Reolink portfolio to a better level than its competitors: \u201cI need to at least make sure that the IP is not a weak point for Reolink.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n While right now the market is still growing, it will one day become mature and that will be followed by litigation. \u201cI hope that if that happens, we\u2019ll be ready, and our IP shall safeguard the business, and even become a leverage for revenue growth like Nokia or Huawei,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mr. Shan doesn\u2019t know where he sees himself in the next five years. But one thing he is certain about is that he wants to constantly be pushing himself beyond his comfort zone: <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI like to try different stuff. If I had continued working for Huawei, my personal income might be way higher but I had already done everything there was to do there and I wanted to go beyond my given scope. I believe it is so important to try new and different stuff. So, if I am still at Reolink, I hope that I\u2019ll have been able to extend way beyond my current IP scope.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Since Dongfang Shan came on board, home security tech firm Reolink has beenLeadership philosophy<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
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Staying ahead of competition<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
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\nramping up its IP efforts. Mr. Shan sat down with ip fray to discuss how he has strengthened the
\ncompany\u2019s patent portfolio and changed internal views \u2013 including by instilling confidence in his
\nsubordinates no matter their experience.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[122,51,146,14,66,143],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1786","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-china","category-huawei","category-multimedia","category-patents","category-via-la-patent-pools","category-wifi"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipfray.com\/staging1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1786","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipfray.com\/staging1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipfray.com\/staging1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipfray.com\/staging1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipfray.com\/staging1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1786"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/ipfray.com\/staging1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1786\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1850,"href":"https:\/\/ipfray.com\/staging1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1786\/revisions\/1850"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipfray.com\/staging1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1786"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipfray.com\/staging1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1786"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipfray.com\/staging1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1786"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}