Huawei and Nokia extends mobile patent deal despite U.S. pressure

Two of the biggest telecom rivals could also be one of the biggest business partners. The latest extension of the mobile technology patent deal between Huawei and Nokia proves this theory quite right.

Huawei officially announced the extension patent license agreement with Nokia. However, the terms of the agreement remain confidential between the parties.

Back in 2017, Huawei and Nokia signed a multi-year patent license agreement. And the latest extension reflects Huawei’s prowess in different technologies, which continues to grow despite immense U.S. pressure.

IN 2019, Huawei was blacklisted by the U.S. government, which prohibits the world’s largest telecom equipment maker from accessing important resources to build new devices. However, the company didn’t stop researching on new technologies and spent a large sum of its investment only in R&D.

According to the information, Huawei’s R&D expenditure was 142.7 billion yuan ($21.28 billion) in 2021, which takes about 22.4 percent of its annual revenue. It’s one of the biggest stacks on research and development of new technologies.

Looking at the patent record, Huawei filed a record 6952 patents last year. From which, alone 3500 patent applications were filed with the EU patent office. As the tech maker held over 110,000 active patents globally by the end of 2021.

That’s not it, Huawei operates of 55 percent of its total workforce (over 100,000 employees) only in R&D facilities.

Other than Nokia, Huawei has also signed a multi-year cross-licensing patent-sharing agreement with its other rivals such as Oppo. The Tech maker will provide networking and 5G tech to the Chinese phone company.

In total, Huawei has partnered with over 20 leading tech companies including Samsung to share patent technologies.

“We are delighted to see our technologies are helping the automotive and other vertical industries in their digitalization,” said Alan Fan, head of Huawei’s intellectual property department. The royalties Huawei receives will in turn fund Huawei’s R&D efforts, he added.