Nokia wins court case against Daimler, but at what cost?

Recently, Nokia won a court ruling against Daimler, whereby the Finnish tech company gained some leverage in its fight over mobile technologies used in automobiles.

As vague as it may seem, Nokia claimed that Daimler (owner of Mercedes-Benz) violated its mobile technology patents, without going into specifics.

“We cannot understand the verdict of the Mannheim court and will appeal,” according to an email statement by Daimler.

Furthermore, judges at the Mannheim court sided with Nokia because Daimler was unwilling to abide by existing rules for the so-called standard essential patents.

This precedence could potentially mean that Nokia could bar Daimler from selling vehicles in Germany, but due to legal proceeding, Nokia would need to post a collateral of EUR 7 billion in a separate proceeding.

According to a statement issued by Jenni Lukander, president of Nokia Technologies, “Today’s finding is a major endorsement of the long-term engineering work by innovators at Nokia and the important principle that innovators should receive a fair reward. We hope that Daimler will now accept its obligations and take a license on fair terms.”

The report by Autonews also mentioned that Nokia is seeking to charge fees per car instead of granting car companies licenses.

Daimler has the support of Continental and Robert Bosch in this legal case, as they are asking the European Commission to go after Nokia with the claim that Nokia is abusing its market power. Other automotive suppliers have also joined the suit to defend Daimler against Nokia.

That said, Nokia has added that companies like BMW and Volkswagen have accepted its license model.