Nokia settles patent dispute with Apple, signs new business collaboration agreement

Nokia on Tuesday (23 May) announced it has settled all litigation related its patent dispute with Apple. It has also signed a licence deal with the iPhone maker.

Last December, Nokia filed a number of lawsuits against Apple claiming the iPhone maker had violated as many as 32 patents. The lawsuits, filed with the regional courts in Dusseldorf, Mannheim and Munich in Germany and the US District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, covered technologies such as display, user interface software, antenna, chipset and video coding.

In a statement earlier, Nokia said: "Since agreeing a licence covering some patents from the Nokia Technologies portfolio in 2011, Apple has declined subsequent offers made by Nokia to license other of its patented inventions which are used by many of Apple's products."

Under the new business collaboration agreement, Nokia will provide its network infrastructure product and services to Apple.

The iPhone maker, on the other hand, will resume selling Nokia digital health products in its retail and online stores. The companies are also exploring future collaboration in digital health initiatives.

"This is a meaningful agreement between Nokia and Apple. It moves our relationship with Apple from being adversaries in court to business partners working for the benefit of our customers," Maria Varsellona, chief legal officer at Nokia, responsible for the company's patent licensing business, said in a statement on 23 May.

Details about the agreement have not been made public yet. However, Nokia will receive an up-front cash payment from Apple, with additional revenues.

"We are pleased with this resolution of our dispute and we look forward to expanding our business relationship with Nokia," said Jeff Williams, Apple's chief operating officer.

The value of the agreement will be reflected partially as patent licensing net sales in Nokia Technologies and the rest as sales in other Nokia business groups. Nokia said it will disclose the patent licensing revenue in its quarterly announcements.

Nokia also plans to provide an update of its capital structure optimisation programme in conjunction with its 2017 third quarter results.