UPC Denies Ericsson’s Preliminary Injunction for Unreasonable Delay

On 15 October 2024 the Lisbon local division of the UPC handed down its first decision by refusing Ericsson's request for a preliminary injunction against AsusTek, Arvata, and Digital River. Ericsson claimed that the defendants were infringing EP2819131 by selling laptops and notebooks that contain either the Intel Wi-Fi 6E AX211 or Wi-Fi 6 AX201 modules.

The application for a preliminary injunction was dismissed on the basis of a lack of urgency. The Defendants argued that the alleged infringing devices were first sold in 2019, and well publicised at the time, yet Ericsson did not react. The Defendants also argued that a similar action lodged in the USA in October 2023 against Lenovo, and ongoing SEP licensing negations between Ericsson and AsusTek show that Ericsson was actively observing the market.

Ericsson did not provide an alternative date on which they became aware of the alleged infringement. Therefore, the date from which an unreasonable delay to initiating proceedings was calculated was 2019 or at best 2023. This led the Court to find that "the Applicant has failed to provide sufficient temporal elements enabling the Court to assess its diligence in initiating proceedings”.

While a finding of lack of urgency is sufficient to reject a request for a preliminary injunction, the Court decided to further address the issues of validity and infringement, and in a preliminary assessment found the patent to be likely valid and infringed.

This was another fast decision from the UPC, with it only taking 4 months from the application for provisional measures to the Portuguese division handing down its ruling earlier this week, confirming the rapid timeline the UPC has proceeded with so far.