AI’s generational licensing opportunity; Nokia sees Q2 royalty surge; Disney hit with new InterDigital UPC sales ban ruling; SEP injunction harmonisation in China; plus much more

Welcome to the latest edition of the Sisvel Insights weekly round-up, aggregating news stories, analyses and data points affecting the SEP world that have caught our eye over the past seven days.

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Willy Chang joined Sisvel in June as our Head of AI Pools. Since then, he has been working hard on the development of new Sisvel programmes related to AI and high-performance computing. Last week, he provided an update on progress, as well as insight into his time at major innovators including

TSMC and Qualcomm. He also talked about the licensing industry’s changing approach to AI and why the data centre represents a generational opportunity for both licensors and licensees.

“Imagine you could go back 20 to 30 years and create SEP licensing solutions for smartphones before anyone else had tried to license that sector,” Willy stated. “You might establish separate pools for cellular, Wi-Fi, codecs, charging and so on. Imagine the friction and transactional costs that could have been saved over the ensuing decades. That is the unique generational opportunity we have with the data centre. I am not sure that has happened before in the history of licensing, and I think Sisvel is in the best position to build out this ecosystem successfully.”

Elsewhere, Nokia announced a sharp uptick in its licensing income for Q2 2026; while InterDigital secured its second UPC injunction against Disney in the pair’s dispute over video coding patents. From China, there was news that the country’s patent office has aligned the standard for an injunction grant in SEP administrative proceedings with that established by the courts.

Please note that the inclusion of a piece in the list below does not signify agreement with what is stated in the linked article – just that we believe it is of interest and worth flagging.

Market

Nokia’s licensing business recorded €407 million in net sales for Q2 2026 – a 14% year-on-year increase. Read more (Nokia Investor Relations). See also IAM🔒

InterDigital has signed a licence agreement with KEBA Energy Automation GmbH related to patents reading on the 3G, 4G and Wi-Fi standards. Read more (InterDigital press release)

Legal

InterDigital has secured another UPC injunction spanning 11 European markets against Disney in a dispute over patents reading on HEVC technology. Read more (InterDigital press release). See also ip fray🔒and IAM 🔒

The UK Supreme Court is expected to hand down its ruling in the closely watched Tesla v InterDigital and Avanci case today. Read more (Joff Wild on LinkedIn)

The Munich I Regional Court’s decision to stay one of Siemens’ two patent infringement actions against Honor is another data point in the debate over when German courts will suspend SEP litigation pending nullity challenges. Read more (ip fray) 🔒

Collision Communications has filed a second US patent infringement lawsuit against Apple in a dispute relating to wireless communications patents. Read more (IAM) 🔒

Proxense has sued Cisco in the Eastern District of Texas, alleging infringement of four wireless networking patents in Cisco’s Wi-Fi 6, 6E and 7 products. Read more (ip fray) 🔒

Policy & Opinion

The CNIPA has brought its standard for administrative SEP injunctions into line with recent jurisprudence from Chinese courts. Read more (ip fray) 🔒

The UPC’s Patent Mediation and Arbitration Centre has revealed the members of a working group tasked with drafting FRAND arbitration guidance. Read more (ip fray). See also MLex 🔒

Users of WIPO’s PATENTSCOPEcan now identify not only patents explicitly declared to ETSI as standard essential but also related patent family members added by ETSI through its Family Extension. Read more (PATENTSCOPE News)

Strategy & Analysis

The AI boom has created a generational opportunity to establish efficient pool licensing solutions for data centres, says Sisvel’s Willy Chang. Read more (Sisvel Insights)

DRAM is one of the first AI infrastructure technologies around which a SEP licensing ecosystem is beginning to develop. Read more (IAM) 🔒

IP rights, and the contractual relationships and other transactional arrangements anchored in them, enable the emergence of “idea factories” that play a critical role in developing and diffusing new technologies in knowledge-based economies. Read more (Jonathan Barnett, Idea Factories)

The arrival of AV2 will increase scrutiny of codec patent validity, with non-patent prior art emerging as a key focal point. Read more (IAM)

Arbitration can become – and sometimes already is – a credible, and in many respects preferable, alternative for the resolution of SEP/FRAND disputes. Read more (IAM)

The Eastern District of Texas delivered the most wins for plaintiffs in US patent suits in Q2 2026. Read more (RPX Empower)