Nokia beats Apple in patent war

Stephen Elop, Nokia's chief executive

Nokia has signed a patent license agreement with Apple. The agreement will result in settlement of all patent litigation between the companies.
Nokia and Apple had been in battle over 40 patent lawsuits in the US, England and Germany, since 2009, relating to the user interface of a smart phone, the phone’s power system, camera and antenna.
This will be seen as a victory for Nokia since it decided to aggressively defend its 10,000+ mobile phone patents. Nokia says it has invested over €43 billion developing its ‘patent families’.
“We are very pleased to have Apple join the growing number of Nokia licensees,” said Stephen Elop, president and chief executive officer of Nokia. “This settlement demonstrates Nokia’s industry leading patent portfolio and enables us to focus on further licensing opportunities in the mobile communications market.”
Nokia’s victory against Apple will have repercussions for other smart phone manufacturers and platform owners. Google, for example, owners of the Android platform may also be in Nokia’s sights. The Android open-source operating system is highly likely to infringe on many of the Nokia patents that the iPhone’s operating system does.
Apple’s settlement with Nokia involved significant sums of money, although no figure has yet been mentioned. Nokia shares rose 1.8% in trading following the announcement to €4.37 per share.