TP-Link has filed a lawsuit against Huawei at the EWHC

Context: Huawei holds a large portfolio of WiFi 6 standard-essential patents (SEPs) and has convinced many companies to take licenses on amicable terms. The only high-profile litigation involving Huawei’s WiFi patents was settled when Netgear opted for a Sisvel pool license (January 4, 2025 ip fray article). The terms of that pool are widely accepted, even by certain large and sophisticated companies known to oppose supra-FRAND (fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory) royalty rates such as Cisco (July 22, 2025 LinkedIn post by ip fray). Huawei is a large implementer of standards in its own right, a strategic consideration that counsels against excessive royalty demands.

What’s new: We have discovered a lawsuit by WiFi router maker TP-Link against Huawei in the High Court of Justice for England & Wales (EWHC) Friday (September 5, 2025) afternoon. No infringement lawsuits by Huawei against TP-Link are known at this point. It appears that TP-Link launched a pre-emptive defensive strike in the UK.

Direct impact: It is surprising that TP-Link is not following the lead of Netgear, Cisco and others. It can seek a FRAND determination in the UK and it can try to obtain an interim-license declaration, but what for? The Munich I Regional Court has made it clear that any attempt to force SEP holders into a global license on foreign-determined terms will be met with a forceful response (July 18, 2025 ip fray article). Interim-license declarations will therefore barely be worth the paper they would be written on if they weren’t handed down electronically anyway.

Wider ramifications:

TP-Link’s defensive efforts against Atlas Global’s enforcement campaign, which has failed miserably so far, have impressed us (LinkedIn post by ip fray). But Huawei is of a rather different caliber and a large-scale implementer itself while Atlas only seeks to extract royalties, which should make it much easier to reach an agreement. Also, TP-Link wouldn’t even be able to rely on its counsel from its wins over Atlas because the Clifford Chance team led by Dr. Tobias Hessel regularly represents Huwei as well.

TP-Link is not the only company to be undeterred by the Munich court’s stern warning. For example, Acer, ASUS and Hisense are pursuing FRAND claims against Nokia in the same court (LinkedIn post by ip fray), as is MediaTek against Huawei (July 7, 2025 ip fray article) and Amazon against InterDigital (LinkedIn post by ip fray). But if all those UK cases end up producing nothing but non-binding declarations, there will be a point at which implementers will refrain from pursuing the UK FRAND route, also in light of the significant costs involved. It could be, however, that companies will continue to buy snake oil for some time, not because it works but because settlement terms and dynamics remain confidential, so someone can always claim that the UK actions resulted in more favorable license fees, whether it is true or not. And some will want to say so in order to justify their advice or decisions and to generate new business. That still doesn’t mean that any of that is a good use of resources.