Europe floats patent overhaul, which obviously everyone's thrilled about

The European Commission late last week proposed rules governing patents on technical standards, ostensibly to ensure innovation, competition, and fair prices. The legislative proposal covers standard essential patents (SEPs), meaning patents that protect technology relevant to common standards, like 5G telephony, Wi-Fi, and …

[AVee]

Must be good.

I'm in favor of this. I have no idea what the implications are but a proposal that pissed of Apple and Qualcomm has got to be a good one.

[Flocke Kroes]

Re: Must be not as awful as they lobbied for

FRAND is a way of not saying UFO (uniform fee) or put another way: use patents as a barrier to free software. Pretty impressive as software is a branch of mathematics and mathematics is not patentable subject matter. (To patent software you have to call it a computer implemented invention.)

A decade ago we would have been better off if the entire patent system had been abolished. Things have not got any better in the last ten years.

[ChoHag]

Re: Must be good.

Go check out the list of members of this "Fair Standards Association". There's no way anything that lot want is any good.

I think you selected the wrong icon though.

[steelpillow]

Re: Must be good.

Indeed. Why should these examples of high morality ever feel a need to deny FRAND licenses to people with faces they don't like? Unfair competition, obviously. But let's be fair - just who is being fair here?

[NIck Hunn]

Bluetooth?

Bluetooth is RANDZ, not FRAND. which means it's not part of the patent gravy train. It's a good example of how working to promote a larger, open market can be successful. It still doesn't stop the patent trolls, but that's another story, which might be a better subject for the European Commission's attention.

[DS999]

Re: Bluetooth?

FRAND and RAND are the same thing, just two different terms for it. Bluetooth is FRAND with a zero royalty.

As you point out the big problem is not a licensing cost of a few cents per device or whatever it might be if they charged but trolls who may or may not have patents relevant to Bluetooth coming along asking for a few dollars per device for their handful of patents and threatening to block imports of your devices if you take them to court rather than immediately sign on the dotted line and pay up. Do the EU reforms do anything to address that? If they don't, it is all a big waste of time. That's where the problems lie, not with real patents owned by companies that employ actual engineers and marketers and what not rather than just a big team of lawyers.

[Anonymous Coward]

The trouble with these industry groups, is that they are invariably patent holders, with an interest in excluding others from the market through IP.

The ones who would be benefiting from these licenses are not being heard from, since they are smaller entities.

So we only ever hear one side of the story.

[veti]

Well take heart, because we have a whole industry dedicated to making sure that the other side - whoever they may be - gets a fair hearing. It's called "the media", and we are commenting on one of its stories right now.

Come to think of it, TFA seems to suggest the existence of at least two sides.