Potential Patent Litigation Risk Assessment for the IoT (Internet of things) Wireless Connectivity Standards

Many market researchers expect that the interconnected IoT devices will create a new market that will result in more than $1 trillion in value added to the global economy within 10 years. Wireless connectivity is the key enabler for the mass deployment of the IoT devices. To assess the potential patent litigation risk for the IoT wireless connectivity, patents that are related to the key wireless standards for the IoT connectivity (LTE, Wireless LAN, Zigbee, Bluetooth, NFC, UHF RFID) are analyzed to evaluate the technology innovation leadership. More than 10,000 issued patents in the US as of May 15, 2015 are reviewed.  Patent disclosures in claims and detail description for each patent are analyzed as to whether the contents are within the scope of key technologies for the relevant standard specifications (3GPP, IEEE, ISO, NFC Forum, Bluetooth SIG). For details about the analysis, please refer “Wireless Patents for Standards & Applications 1Q 2015” (http://www.slideshare.net/alexglee/wireless-patents-for-standards-applications-1q-2015).

More than 3,000 patents hold by more than 160 assignees are identified as the key wireless standard patents for the IoT connectivity. To assess the potential patent litigation risk, the identified wireless standard patents for the IoT connectivity are further analyzed to figure out the patents that might be exploited for litigation: Patents owned by a NPE (NPE Passive) that may be transferred to other entities that might exploit them for litigation; Patents owned by a NPE (NPE Active) will enforce them; Patents owned by a NPE (NPE PAE) will enforce them for monetization purpose; Patents owned by a PE (Privateer) that may be transferred to other entities that will enforce them for monetization purpose; and Patents owned by a PE that are transferred to other entities for the unknown purpose (Suspected Assignment). 

More than 700 patents hold by more than 30 assignees are identified as the patents that might be exploited for litigation. PE PAEs, NPE PAEs, Privateers, NPE Actives, NPE Passives hold 44%, 31%, 9%,  8% and 7% of the total patents with the potential litigation risk respectively. The IPR share of patents for the Suspected Assignment is 1%.

For more information, please contact Alex Lee at alexglee@techipm.com.

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