Apr 13, 2009The RFID Consortium, a group of RFID vendors that hold patents essential to the development and use of ultrahigh-frequency (UHF) RFID products that leverage standards defined by EPCglobal and ISO, has announced that it has hired the Sisvel Group to administer its UHF RFID patent licensing program. The consortium also reports that it expects to begin offering licensees in the second quarter of this year.
The consortium currently has seven members, and was formed in 2005 as an intellectual property (IP) licensing consortium—essentially, a patent pool—to make it easier for vendors to license patents, reduce risks for end users and provide a convenient method for patent holders to manage their IP (see RFID Vendors to Launch Patent Pool). Its members consist of 3M Innovative Properties Co. (a subsidiary of 3M), France Telecom, Hewlett-Packard (HP), LG Electronics, Motorola, ThingMagic and Zebra Technologies.
Sisvel is an established IP management firm with companies in Italy (Sisvel, in None Torinese, and Edico, in Rome), the United States (Sisvel US and Audio MPEG, in Washington, D.C.), China (Sisvel Hong Kong), Japan (Sisvel Japan, in Tokyo), and Germany (Sisvel Germany, in Stuttgart). The firm employs more than 70 professionals worldwide with technical, legal and licensing expertise. Under the terms of the agreement, Sisvel will administer the RFID Consortium's pool through Sisvel UHF RFID, a newly created Sisvel US subsidiary formed to administer the UHF RFID licensing program.
The RFID Consortium has worked with other IP management firms during its formation. In 2006, it hired Via Licensing Corp. to help it get up and running, establish the consortium as a limited-liability corporation and assist patent holders in joining the patent pool. Via Licensing also helped it craft and submit a business plan to the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), which reviewed the patent pool and the RFID Consortium in order to ensure its arrangement does not threaten any antitrust laws.
Sean Corey, Sisvel Group's IP counsel, says: "The formation or facilitation phase of a patent pool is a long process, and a delicate, almost diplomatic process to bring the parties together. It is very typical to take several years to pull everyone together, and to have that DOJ business letter out."
Although the consortium plans to make its patents available toward the end of the second quarter of 2009, the group is still encouraging other companies and patent-holders to join, if there is a fit. "We believe that there are hundreds of other RFID patents out there," O'Hagan says, "some of which may be essential, and if anybody has patents, there is still time to have the patents evaluated and then become a part of the consortium as a founding member." In fact, the consortium has conducted some preliminary research on the market, and has discovered more than 13,000 published patents and applications for patents involving RFID. Those patents are spread across a large number of companies worldwide, O'Hagan says, but the consortium has identified approximately 70 firms that hold at least 15 patents or applications.
Companies that own RFID-related patents include RPX Corp., a patent aggregator that buys various patent portfolios, including those involving radio frequency identification, in order to help high-tech companies fight patent assertions and associated litigation costs (see Startup Company Seeks RFID and Other Patents).
