On February 18th, 2015, the Tokyo District Court ruled that sending a notice to the infringers of FRAND patents stating that the proprietor has the right to obtain injunction would be considered to be a “false accusation” and is prohibited as “unfair competition” by the Unfair Competition Prevention Act Article 2 (xiv).
This decision was based on a preceding IP high court decision on the Japanese “Apple v. Samsung” case on May 16, 2014 which ruled that the assertion of the right to injunctive relief by a patent owner would be considered an abuse of patent rights when the infringer succeeds in proving in court to have been a willing licensee.
This presentation analyzes and discusses the legal and factual implications of the February 18th Tokyo District Court decision, which is an interesting development of the case law concerning FRAND patents in Japan, and the preceding May 16th IP High Court decision on which the Tokyo District Court case is based on. The decision, along with other relevant rules concerning damages in cases of patent infringement in Japan, greatly lowered the enforceability of FRAND declared patents, and is factually shoving the Japanese companies away from FRAND declarations, despite the intention of the court to enhance free usage of FRAND declared patents.
Ms.Yuzuki Nagakoshi is a Guest Researcher at Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition and she is an Overseas Researcher of the Institute of Intellectual Property and Japan Patent Office. She got her Bachelor’s Degree from University of Tokyo (Japan) and Master’s Degree from Tsinghua University (Beijing, P.R.China). Now she is a Doctorate Student of University of Tokyo. Area of her Expertise are Intellectual Property Law, Patent Law, Technology Transfer, Public Policy Analysis.