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UPC Mannheim LD agrees with UK judge on Amazon’s declaration being “nonsense” but refrains from imposing sanctions at this point: comity

Florian Mueller

Context:

  • There is a complex web of cross-jurisdictional interdependencies in the dispute between InterDigital and Amazon. In our previous article on this subject we noted that orders by the Unified Patent Court’s (UPC) Mannheim Local Division (LD) and the High Court of Justice for England & Wales (EWHC) exposed the deficiency of a “declaration” Amazon made in the UK as compared to a commitment it had made to the UPC (March 9, 2026 ip fray article). Put differently, Amazon just used a UK hearing to have a machine translation of a commitment to the UPC notarized by Mr Justice Richard Meade of the EWHC instead of taking the necessary steps to enter into a legally binding and enforceable (by InterDigital if need be) covenant.
  • The UPC gave Amazon until last week’s Wednesday (March 18, 2026) to demonstrate compliance.

What’s new: Today, Presiding Judge Prof. Peter Tochtermann entered an order on behalf of the three-judge panel, criticizing the insufficiency of Amazon’s conduct while acknowledging that Mr Justice Meade could not be blamed and thanking him for having provided an explanation of what effects different instruments have under UK law. The two courts have now practically agreed to disagree in some ways, but they do concur on Amazon’s UK “declaration” amounting to “nonsense”. With comity in mind, and knowing that there was no risk of any practical issues arising between now and the May 28, 2026 UPC appellate hearing, the Mannheim LD refrained from imposing a fine on Amazon at this stage.

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UPC panels and counsel

CoA

Presiding Judge Ulrike Voss (“Voß” in German) was recently sworn in as the Presiding Judge of the CoA’s new Panel 3. But for this case she is joined by President Dr. Grabinski’s trusted sidekicks Judge-rapporteur Prof. Peter Blok and Judge Emmanuel Gougé (Panel 1). Presiding Judge Voss is famous in the SEP context for her referral of Huawei v. ZTE to the European Court of Justice (ECJ) while she was presiding over one of the divisions of the Dusseldorf Regional Court. For the Munich LD, she granted Nokia an anti-antisuit injunction against SUNMI (February 20, 2025 ip fray article).

Mannheim LD panel

Presiding Judge (and here, judge-rapporteur) Prof. Peter Tochtermann, Judge Dirk Boettcher (“Böttcher” in German), and Judge András Kupecz (CD Munich; August 30, 2024 ip fray interview). Temporarily, Judge Tobias Sender  filled in for Judge Boettcher, but the latter was on the panel that held the February 27, 2026 hearing.

Today’s order was signed by the presiding judge alone, but with reference to a mandate by the entire panel.

Counsel for InterDigital

Counsel for InterDigital: Arnold Ruess‘s Cordula Schumacher (also lead counsel on appeal), Dr.  Lisa Rieth, Tim Smentkowski, Julija Kravtsova, and Dr. Marina Wehler. From the UK, Bird & Bird’s Richard Vary attended the February 27, 2026 hearing. U.S. attorney Richard Kamprath of McKool Smith was among the remote attendees of various related hearings. In-house litigation counsel Steven Akerley attended the two Mannheim hearings in person, and several other InterDigital lawyers and executives followed the video stream.

Counsel for Amazon