• Huawei has announced that it has two cross-licensing agreements in place with a pair of its mobile competitors.
• The agreements are with OPPO and Samsung, covering global patents in particular.
• The focus appears to be on cellular patents, with 5G specifically mentioned.

In a rather surprising bit of news for the telecommunications industry, Huawei has announced that it has signed two cross-licensing agreements with companies it is traditionally rivals with in the mobile space – OPPO and Samsung.

We should point out that each deal, although announced at similar times, differ slightly in their nature, and as such are separate from one another. As such, what applies to OPPO does not apply to Samsung for example.

“This is mutual recognition of IP value between companies helps foster a positive cycle of innovation and research in high-value standards: investing, receiving returns from investment, and then reinvesting. This will enable our industry to keep innovating and provide consumers with more competitive products and services,” explained Huawei in a press release sent to Hypertext.

That said, it looks as if cellular patents, and 5G in particular, are the focus for the cross-licensing agreements.

While the terms of the deal have not been disclosed, Huawei does expect the deal with Samsung to result in vast number of licence requirements in the new year. “In 2022 alone, we expect there will be around 20 new or extended licenses we would execute. We estimate these licenses would cover about 350 million 5G phones and more than 15 million connected vehicles sold globally this year,” it added. 

As for the OPPO side of things, Alan Fan, head of Huawei’s Intellectual Property Department, noted that, “The mutual recognition of intellectual property value between companies is a major step towards fostering a positive cycle of innovation and research in high-value standards: investing, receiving returns from investment, and then reinvesting. This will enable our industry to keep innovating and provide consumers with more competitive products and services.”

It is still early days, but it will be interesting to see what these agreements will yield. We for one, are curious for what this could mean in regions where Huawei is barred from selling product or rolling out 5G infrastructure.