EU regulators are investigating whether Samsung Electronics Co Ltd and Apple Inc may have breached EU antitrust laws with patent infringement claims in their global legal battle over the lucrative smartphone and tablet market. The two technology companies are embroiled in more than 20 legal disputes in 10 countries.
"The (European) Commission has indeed sent requests for information to Apple and Samsung concerning the enforcement of 'standards-essential' patents in the mobile telephony sector," the European Commission said in a statement on Friday. "Such requests for information are standard procedure in antitrust investigations, to allow the Commission to establish the relevant facts in a case. We have no other comments at this stage," it added.
Standards-essential patents means they have been incorporated in internationally accepted technology standards, which in the case of Samsung and Apple, means 3G and UMTS technology. Samsung said in a statement it had "at all times remained committed to fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory (FRAND) licensing terms" for its wireless standards-related patents.
"We have received a request for information from the European Commission and are co-operating fully," it said. Samsung has brought patent infringement claims against Apple in several EU courts, accusing its rival of not paying licensing fees for some of its patents before Apple started selling iPhones.