What are Standard Essential Patents (SEP)?

About Standard Essential Patents (SEP)

• A SEP is a patent granted for a technological invention which is essential for the implementation and working of a standard.

What is a Standard?

• A ‘standard’ is a set of technical requirements or agreed technical descriptions which cover ideas, products, or services and make sure that technologies interact and work together.
• Standards can be adopted worldwide, regionally or even nationally.
• It is usually in the interest of industrial players to create products that comply with standards.
• One example of a widely used standard is the A4 size for sheets of paper.
• Patents which are essentialto a standard and have been adopted by a Standard Setting Organization (SSO) are known as SEPs.
• SSOs are either governmental, quasigovernmental,or a private group of independently governed industry associations.
• SSOs set, develop, coordinate, interpret, and maintain standards.
• Industry participants can collaborate on a single technical solution because of such standards.
• When a patent is acknowledged by the SSO and designated as a SEP, manufacturers canonly produce their goods in the market after first acquiring a licenseunder the SEP.
• From an antitrust standpoint, the lack of any competing technology grants the SEP holder a monopolistic right over the SEP.
• Consequently, it is impossible to produce products that comply with standards without using technologies that are covered by one or more SEPs.
• SEPs are common in the mobile telephony and telecommunications industry, a sector which is highly standardised due mainly to the need for interoperability between mobile devices.

Q1: What is a patent?

A patent is an exclusive right granted for an invention, which is a product or a process that provides, in general, a new way of doing something, or offers a new technical solution to a problem. To get a patent, technical information about the invention must be disclosed to the public in a patent application.

Source:The judiciary’s shadow over standard essential patents