The Delhi High Court on December 08, 2014 has passed an interim injunction against Xiaomi and its local e-commerce partner Flipkart until February 05, 2015 in response to the suit filed by Ericsson accusing Xiaomi of infringing its standard essential patents (SEP) pertaining to AMR, EDGE and 3G technologies.
The Chinese smartphone maker Xiaomi has entered into exclusive agreement with Flipkart that sells and markets its allegedly infringing devices/handsets in India. It has sold more than 80,000 smartphones since its launch in July in India and has occupied more than 1% share of India’s smartphone market.
Ericsson alleged that it had already proposed to Xiaomi to obtain license from them to use the patents, but Xiaomi did not accept it instead entered the Indian market and opened an Indian subsidiary Xiaomi Technology India Pvt. Ltd.
The details of SEPs which are allegedly infringed are as below:
| Ericsson’s SEP Patents infringed by Xiaomi | ||
| AMR Technology | 3G Technology | Edge Technology |
| IN203034 | IN229632 | IN241747 |
| IN203036 | IN240471 | |
| IN234157 | – | – |
| IN203686 | – | – |
| IN213723 | – | – |
The Court has directed the following till the next date of hearing:
(i) The Defendants (Xiaomi, its Indian subsidiary and Flipkart) are restricted from manufacturing, assembling, importing, selling, offering for sale or advertising through their and third party, websites, products (telephone instruments, mobile handsets, tablets, hand-held devices, dongles, etc.) and any future or other devices or models that include the AMR, 3G and EDGE technology/devices/apparatus as patented by Ericsson.
(ii) The Central Board of Excise and Customs is directed to prohibit any import of Xiaomi’s infringing mobiles, handsets, devices, tablets, etc. and customs authorities are to intimate Ericsson about any such consignments.
(iii) The Defendants are required to file an Affidavit disclosing the:
- Quantum of devices (handsets, tablets, etc.) sold by it in India till date that are infringing in nature; and
- Revenue earned till date from the sale of mobile devices (handsets, tablets, etc.)