Xiaomi-Ericsson legal battle ends; over 100,000 Redmi Note handsets to be sent back

The Delhi High Court has allowed Xiaomi to call back its Redmi Note handsets, the sale of which was banned in India on Ericsson's plea alleging patent violation, coming as a big relief to the Chinese mobile phone maker.

A vacation bench of Justice Mukta Gupta on Tuesday permitted Xiaomi to return over 100,000 handsets to their point of origin in Hong Kong, after Swedish telecom firm Telefonaktiebolaget LM Ericsson agreed to the arrangement.

This also brings to an end the legal battle between Xiaomi and Ericsson over disputed technology.

The court directed Xiaomi to maintain an inventory of the handsets, currently lying unused with e-commerce site Flipkart, through which the Chinese company sells its phones under an exclusive arrangement.

Redmi Note, which runs on a MediaTek processor, is prohibited in India and the high court has allowed the sale of only Qualcomm chipset-based phones, rendering other Xiaomi handsets unusable, Advocate Ajit Warrier, appearing for the Chinese firm, said.

The court had, on 16 December last year, permitted Xiaomi to sell its Qualcomm chipset-based devices as a temporary measure till the issue of patent infringement has been decided.

The single judge had, on 8 December, restrained Xiaomi and Flipkart from selling in India handsets that run on the technology patented by Ericsson (See: HC bars Xiaomi from selling phones in India on Ericsson plaint).

Xiaomi challenged the order and got 'pro tem' order allowing it to sell its Qualcomm chipset-based devices (Xiaomi to fight Delhi High Court order to resume smartphone sales).http://www.domain-b.com/companies/companies_e/Ericsson/20141215_smartphone.html

The case pertains to standard essential patents used in AMR, 2G, 3G and Edge technologies. Ericsson has alleged infringements of its patents relating to these technologies by Xiaomi.

Mobile phones cannot be made without the GSM, GPRS, EDGE and WCDMA technology, which are patented by Ericsson.