CEN and CENELEC welcome the European Commission’s public consultation and call for evidence on standard essential patents.
As a preliminary remark, it should be reminded that CEN and CENELEC are not involved in evaluating the relevance or essentiality of patents with regard to standards under development, interfering with licensing negotiations, or engaging in settling patent disputes. Notwithstanding this, CEN and CENELEC responded to this consultation, to clarify several points found in the European Commission’s introductory document (Ref. Ares(2022)1076263 - 14/02/2022).
The full text of CEN and CENELEC’s response can be found here.
In relation to standard essential patents, CEN and CENELEC relentlessly strive for a balanced approach to help ensure a reasonable return to those innovators that bring their contribution to standards whilst allowing a fair access to the patented technology for the implementers of the standards.
Further information can be found in:
- the CEN-CENELEC Guide 39 “The role of standards in support of Technology Transfer, Edition 1, March 2022”, as may be revised over time; and,
- the CEN-CENELEC Guide 8 “Guidelines for Implementation of the Common Policy on Patents (and other statutory intellectual property rights based on inventions), Edition 2, May 2019”, as may be revised over time.
CEN and CENELEC remain open to engage with the European Commission or other stakeholders to discuss the interplay between patents and standards.
