Internet DRAFT - draft-benham-rtcweb-vp8litigation

draft-benham-rtcweb-vp8litigation






Network Working Group                                          D. Benham
Internet Draft                                              J. Rosenberg
Intended status: Informational                             Cisco Systems
Expires: May 7, 2015
                                                        November 7, 2014



                  VP8 Related Litigation Status Snapshot
                   draft-benham-rtcweb-vp8litigation-01


Abstract

   There remains a great deal of confusion in the industry about the
   state of patent litigation and IPR disclosures around VP8. To
   facilitate greater understanding, Duane Morris LLP drafted a
   paper that summarizes the current state of disclosures and patent
   litigation based on publically available materials, and has posted a
   comprehensive report on the Internet. This Internet Draft provides a
   high level summary of that report. Cisco Systems requested and funded
   Duane Morris to prepare this report.

Status of this Memo

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   This Internet-Draft will expire on May 7, 2015.

Copyright Notice

   Copyright (c) 2014 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the
   document authors. All rights reserved.

   This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal
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   the Trust Legal Provisions and are provided without warranty as
   described in the Simplified BSD License.

Table of Contents

   1. Introduction...................................................2
   2. VP8-related IPR Statement or Declarations......................3
      2.1. IETF IPR Statements for RFC 6386..........................3
      2.2. ISO/IEC IPR Declarations for Video Coding for Browsers (VCB)
      ...............................................................4
   3. VP8 Related Litigation.........................................4
   4. IANA Considerations............................................5
   5. Security Considerations........................................5
   6. References.....................................................5
      6.1. Normative References......................................5
      6.2. Informative References....................................5
   Authors' Addresses................................................6


1. Introduction

   There remains a great deal of confusion in the industry about the
   state of patent litigation and IPR disclosures around VP8. To
   facilitate greater understanding, Duane Morris LLP drafted   a report
   that summarizes the current state of disclosures and litigation based
   on publically available materials, and has posted the analysis on the
   Internet [DM].

   The report is based on press releases, online reports, public court
   dockets and patent registrars.  Duane Morris was not involved in any
   aspect of the litigation described in the report.

   Cisco Systems requested and funded Duane Morris to prepare this
   report.

   The information contained in the Duane Morris paper [DM] is not
   intended to address the merits of any party's position; it is meant
   to provide an impartial summary of litigation known to relate to VP8.

   For those that are intimidated by the length and legalese in the
   Duane Morris report, this draft provides a high level summary. The
   report covers two main areas - first, it documents the known patent
   statements made against VP8 standards initiatives. The results are
   summarized in Section 2. Secondly, it documents the current state of
   patent litigation around VP8, summarized in Section 3.









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2. VP8-related IPR Statement or Declarations



   VP8 "standards initiatives" exist in two places. The first is IETF
   RFC 6386, an informational RFC that documents the VP8 bitstream
   format and decoder. The second is an ISO/IEC project called Video
   Coding for Browsers (VCB). The VCB project is looking to produce a
   formal standard around VP8.

   Both IETF and ISO/IEC ask patent holders to submit patent statements
   and/or licensing declarations relevant to their respective work.
   Section 2.1 summarizes patent statements against the IETF RFC for
   VP8, and Section 2.2 against ISO/IEC VCB.

2.1. IETF IPR Statements for RFC 6386

       +----------------------+---------------+-----------+
       | IETF Statements      | Type          | Note/Ref  |
       +----------------------+---------------+-----------+
       | Nokia                | No License    | [NOK1]    |
       | Ericcson             | ~RAND         | [ERC1]    |
       | Google               | ~RAND-Z       | [GOOG1]   |
       +----------------------+---------------+-----------+

              Table 1 - IETF IPR Statements for VP8



   IETF has received three IPR statements, enumerated in the table
   above. RAND stands for "Reasonable and Non-Discriminatory" as an
   umbrella for a broad range of licenses that may incur a cost but are
   meant to enable practitioners to utilize the technology. RAND-Z
   stands for "Reasonable and Non-Discriminatory with Zero royalty,"
   which has the important addition of being free of royalty fees. "No
   license" means that the patent holder is not willing to license the
   technology for use in the related specification.

















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2.2. ISO/IEC IPR Declarations for Video Coding for Browsers (VCB)

      +----------------------+-----------------+-----------+
      | ISO/IEC Declarations | Type            | Note/Ref  |
      +----------------------+-----------------+-----------+
      | Google               | 1 (~RAND-Z)     | [GOOG2]   |
      | Microsoft            | 2 (~RAND)       | [MSFT1]   |
      | Nokia                | 3 (no license)  |           |
      | Panasonic            | 2 (~RAND)       |  Note 1   |
      | Mitsubishi Electric  | 2 (~RAND)       |  Note 1   |
      | Dolby Labs           | 2 (~RAND)       |           |
      +----------------------+-----------------+-----------+

            Table 2 - ISO/IEC IPR Declarations for VP8

   Table 2 summarizes the state of IPR declarations against the ISO/IEC
   draft standard for VCB.

   Note 1: Panasonic and Mitsubishi Electric are also listed as "Primary
   Licensors" under the VP8 Cross-License agreement as reported in
   section B of the Duane Morris paper [DM].



3. VP8 Related Litigation

   +------------------------------+-----------------+--------------+
   | VP8 Related Litigation       | Status          |  Note/Ref    |
   +------------------------------+-----------------+--------------+
   | Nokia v HTC - Germany        | Settlement $$   |   Note 2     |
   | Nokia v HTC - US-ITC         | Settlement $$   |   Note 3     |
   | VSL/Max Sound v Google - US  | Recently Filed  |   Note 4     |
   | Nullify '881 - Germany       | Active          |   by Google  |
   | Nullify '177 - Germany       | Active          |   by Google  |
   +------------------------------+-----------------+--------------+

                    Table 3 - VP8 Related Litigation

   Table 3 summarizes the publically available cases of litigation
   against VP8. There are five cases, two of which have settled for an
   undisclosed monetary amount. A third case was recently filed. Two
   Nokia patent nullification cases brought by Google are active.

   Note 2:  The German court suspended the '881 Patent infringement case
   to allow the invalidity case to proceed first, which happens in a
   separate court.  The German court dismissed the '177 Patent
   infringement case.  Before any decisions on the '881 Patent, Nokia
   and HTC submitted a joint motion to terminate the infringement and
   invalidity cases based upon their reaching a global "settlement" on
   all then-pending patent litigation, which included HTC payments of an
   undisclosed amount to Nokia. This motion was granted.




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   Note 3: The US-ITC did not issue a ruling on the alleged infringement
   or invalidity of the '211 Patent.  Instead, Nokia and HTC submitted a
   joint motion to terminate the investigation based upon their reaching
   a global "settlement" on all then-pending patent litigation, which
   included HTC payments of an undisclosed amount to Nokia. This motion
   was granted, concluding the US-ITC's investigation.  No active
   litigation was found trying to separately nullify the '211 Patent.

   Note 4: This lawsuit was recently bought against Google for the
   infringement of VSL's '339 Patent in its products such as VP8, VP9,
   WebM, YouTube.com, etc.



4. IANA Considerations

   There are no IANA considerations for this document.

5. Security Considerations

   There are no Security considerations for this document.

6. References

6.1. Normative References

6.2. Informative References

   [DM]        Duane Morris, LLP., "Summary of Known Patent Litigation
               Related to VP8," October 27, 2014,
               <http://www.duanemorris.com/memo/VP8Compilation.pdf>.

   [ERC1]      LM Ericsson, "Telefonaktiebolaget LM Ericsson (publ)'s
               Statement about IPR related to RFC 6386," May 14, 2014,
               <https://datatracker.ietf.org/ipr/2360/>

   [GOOG1]     Google Inc., "Google Inc's Statement of IPR Related to
               draft-bankoski-vp8-bitstream-02.," May 18, 2011,
               <https://datatracker.ietf.org/ipr/1571/>

   [GOOG2]     Google Inc., "Patent Statement and Licensing Declaration
               for ISO/IEC 14496-31," June 30, 2014,
               <http://patents.iec.ch/TISS/Patents.nsf/0/CEEA7ED83FDA0FA
               5C1257D4E0032B62E/$file/isoiec14996-31.pdf>

   [MSFT1]     Microsoft Corporation, "Patent Statement and Licensing
               Declaration for ISO/IEC 14496-31," July 9, 2014,
               <http://patents.iec.ch/TISS/Patents.nsf/0/18BD602F5BC9BEE
               4C1257D4E003182CE/$file/ISOIEC14496-31.pdf>





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   [NOK1]      Nokia Corporation, "Nokia Corporation's Statement about
               IPR related to RFC 6386," March 21, 2013,
               <https://datatracker.ietf.org/ipr/2035/>



Authors' Addresses


   David Benham
   Cisco Systems, Inc.
   170 W Tasman Dr.
   San Jose
   USA

   Email: dbenham@cisco.com


   Jonathan Rosenberg
   Cisco
   170 West Tasman Drive
   San Jose, CA  95134
   USA

   Email: jdrosen@cisco.com





























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