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UK appeals court permanently stays Acer, ASUS FRAND cases against Nokia: arbitration acceptable; no more FRAND trial

Florian Mueller

Context:

  • A couple of weeks ago, the Court of Appeal of England and Wales (EWCA) heard Nokia’s appeal of jurisdictional and interim-license decisions that the High Court of Justice for England and Wales (EWHC) had made in favor of Acer and ASUS, from whom Nokia seeks video patent royalties and who are, partly indirectly, suing Nokia’s customers over cellular standard-essential patents (SEPs). As we reported, the judges pressed the two computer makers on their refusal to engage in arbitration (April 23, 2026 ip fray article).
  • Previously, only one SEP holder had won a UK interim-license appeal: ZTE against Samsung (October 31, 2025 ip fray article).
  • Last week, Ericsson’s patent assertion chief argued in a LinkedIn article that arbitration must be a safe harbor against antisuit injunctions (ASIs) in the form of interim licenses (May 6, 2026 ip fray article).

What’s new: The EWCA has just handed down its ruling, and the net effect is that Acer and ASUS’s UK actions have been permanently stayed because Nokia has complied with its (F)RAND1 (fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory) licensing obligations by offering adjustable (through arbitration) licenses. By rejecting Nokia’s proposed solution, Acer and ASUS’s (F)RAND actions have no real prospect of success.

Direct impact:

  • The UK (F)RAND trial, which was scheduled for June and July 2026, is now canceled. While the appeals court technically allowed service, the practical effect is that Acer and ASUS have no case left.
  • This means that they are now dependent on the adjudication of their (F)RAND defenses by other courts. In the Munich I Regional Court, they have already lost two cases each (March 26, 2026 ip fray article).
  • The likelihood of a settlement increases. TV maker Hisense, which was sued at the same time (April 2025), already settled earlier this year (January 8, 2026 ip fray article).
  • Theoretically, Acer and ASUS could try to appeal the case further, but various injunctions and possibly U.S. import bans would come down before, and it is very doubtful that the UK Supreme Court (UKSC) would even want to deal with this issue. It sometimes grants SEP-related petitions, but it can’t hear SEP cases all the time, especially not over weak petitions.

Wider ramifications:

UK-related

  • By upholding the EWHC decision to serve those complaints on Nokia under Gateway 11 (property located in the jurisdiction; here: patents registered with the UK Intellectual Property Office (IPO)), the EWCA does not solve the fundamental problem of UK jurisdictional overreach on global FRAND determinations.
  • But by overruling the EWHC with respect to Gateways 16A (claims for declaratory relief if actions could conversely be brought against them in the UK) and 4A (complex claims arising out of the same or closely connected facts as the ones under which service is possible under another gateway) in these specific circumstances, the EWCA at least makes another step in the right direction of curbing jurisdictional imperialism.
  • The UK judiciary is increasingly isolated because of its FRAND overreach and the EWHC’s lowball FRAND rate determinations. It does not reflect favorably on the UK when it proposes a rate that is roughly half of what the Unified Patent Court and courts in China, Germany, and Brazil consider FRAND (May 12, 2026 ip fray article).

Beyond the UK

  • It is a huge problem for Acer and ASUS that an appeals court has now found that Nokia discharged its FRAND licensing obligations while the two computer makers did not. They will now find it even harder to convince other courts that they are not unwilling licensees or to persuade courts to find Nokia out of FRAND compliance.

Nokia had appealed not only the denial of its jurisdictional objection and the grant of an interim-license declaration, but also the denial of its motion for a case management stay. The latter has now been granted by the appeals court (unanimously).

Nokia provided the following statement:

In Acer and ASUSTek’s litigation against Nokia in the UK, the Court of Appeal has found in favour of Nokia, and stayed Acer and ASUS’s claims. The Court of Appeal has held that the case should be stayed permanently. The RAND trial, which was scheduled for June and July of this year, will now not proceed.

There is a limit to gamesmanship. In the same appeals court, ZTE prevailed over Samsung because China was deemed a suitable forum. Now, an arbitration offer (to determine the terms of a cross-license) with the equivalent of an interim license during the proceedings has also been deemed a basis on which implementers cannot avail themselves of the English courts.

This decision may pave the way for a settlement, be it an outright settlement or an acceptance of Nokia’s arbitration offer.

  1. In these cases, the term chosen by the standard-setting organization in question (the International Telecommunication Union (ITU)) is RAND, not FRAND, but the omission of the F changes nothing in legal terms. ↩︎