Context: Via Licensing Alliance (Via) established its Voice Codec patent pool almost 18 months ago, offering licenses to multiple patents underpinning speech-coding standards, including Enhanced Voice Services (EVS) and Immersive Voice and Audio Services (IVAS) (December 10, 2024 ip fray article).
What’s new: Via has signed up a new, unnamed licensee to the Voice Codec pool, as well as bringing two new licensors on board: Cordial IP K.K. and NovaVoice Limited.
Direct impact: Cordial IP and NovaVoice join five other announced licensors in the pool: Dolby, South Korea’s Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute (ETRI), Huawei, JVC Kenwood, and NTT (which featured in an interview with their Chief IP Strategist earlier this month: May 4, 2026 ip fray article). The only licensee named so far is Huawei.
Wider ramifications: The signing up of new licensors and licensees demonstrates growing interest in the Voice Codec pool, which takes a somewhat unorthodox approach by bundling established and nascent standards. EVS enables high-quality voice communication over 4G LTE, 5G, and 5G-Advanced networks, while IVAS is in much earlier stages of development and could play a role in 6G, as well as in advanced non-cellular communications.
Cordial IP is a Tokyo-based entity, while NovaVoice is from Hong Kong and focuses on advanced voice coding, licensing out its standard-essential EVS patents.
Via’s President, Kevin Mack, told ip fray in an interview that one of the administrator’s key focuses for 2026 would be “nurturing” this particular program (April 1, 2026 ip fray article). As noted in a statement by Mr. Mack today, these new entries align with that focus and signal the “continued growth and momentum of [the] Voice Codec program”.
He added:
“This pool license offers strong value relative to other market options and represents the only collaborative licensing solution for EVS and IVAS technologies, making it a smart and efficient pathway for companies seeking to license critical voice capabilities.”
In terms of pricing, Via offers per-unit payment across two tiers: one for higher-income countries (R1) and another for the rest of the world (R2). In common with some of its other pool programs, it also offers a “Committed Volume Option”. :
| Product category | Standard per-unit fee | In-compliance per-unit fee |
| R1 | $0.60 | $0.50 |
| R2 | $0.40 | $0.35 |
| Volume commitment | Standard CVO fee | In-compliance CVO fee |
| R1+R2 | $0.48 | $0.40 |
| R1 only | $0.48 | $0.40 |
Olivia Sophie Rafferty contributed to this story.