Standards-essential patents (SEPs) cover, as the name suggests, technology that is essential to certain standards. SEPs are supposed to be licensed by the patent-holder on so-called fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory (FRAND) terms — essentially, because this technology is so important, the patent holder is not supposed to try blocking rivals from using it as long as they are willing to pay a FRAND rate.

In the case of Motorola, the SEPs in question cover part of the GPRS standard, which is in turn part of the rather important GSM cellular standard. Motorola and Google tried to get Apple to pay a rate of 2.25 percent of the entire device’s sale price in order to use the technology. Apple said this wasn’t a reasonable rate and Motorola sued in Germany, eventually winning its case and threatening the sales of iOS devices in that country. The Commission opened an investigation into this in April 2012.

Crucial to the Commission’s “statement of objections” today, Apple had agreed to let the German court set a reasonable licensing rate, but Motorola had pushed on with enforcing the injunction anyway. This showed Apple had been willing to pay something to Motorola – without that willingness, the Commission suggested, it might not have stepped in.

As the Commission summarized its preliminary conclusion:

“The seeking and enforcing of an injunction for SEPs can constitute an abuse of a dominant position in the exceptional circumstances of this case – where the holder of a SEP has given a commitment to license these patents on FRAND terms and where the company against which an injunction is sought has shown to be willing to enter into a FRAND licence.”

That said, Motorola maintained in its own statement today that “Apple had to make six offers before the court recognized them as a willing licensee.”

A statement of objections is effectively a warning and an invitation to the target to defend itself – after that defence has been heard, the Commission will come up with a final judgement.

In a statement on Monday, EU Competition Commissioner Joaquín Almunia said SEPs should not act as blockers to competition:

“The protection of intellectual property is a cornerstone of innovation and growth. But so is competition. I think that companies should spend their time innovating and competing on the merits of the products they offer — not misusing their intellectual property rights to hold up competitors to the detriment of innovation and consumer choice.”

In its statement, the Commission highlighted the difference between its preliminary ruling and the U.S. Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC) proposed Consent Order that would force Motorola to play by the FRAND rules — that order would only apply to Motorola’s future dealings, while the European Commission is preparing to rule on what Motorola has already done.

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All other major manufacturers lost share in a market that includes 133.7 million American smartphone owners. HTC, which Thursday debuted HTC First, a phone that comes pre-installed with Facebook custom launcher Facebook Home, had the biggest decline, with its share of smartphone users dropping 1.7 percent. Apple, meanwhile, was up almost 3.9 percentage points.

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The Patent Office approved the new “invention” this week and the news was first reported on Twitter by Professor Sarah Burstein:

First, rounded rectangles; now, rounded octagons. D678,232, issued to @Motorola for a “Communication Device.” http://t.co/jLkfsTM3lp—
Sarah Burstein (@design_law) March 21, 2013

Burstein, who is a design patent expert at the University of Oklahoma, explained that her “rounded octagon” comment was tongue-in-cheek but confirmed that the patent had been granted and that it covers the displayed shape of a smartphone.

She added that the scope of Motorola’s design patent is more narrow than Apple’s infamous rounded rectangles patent. Here is a picture from Apple’s patent:

To successfully invoke its new patent against an infringer, Burstein said Motorola would have to show that a consumer would find the supposedly infringing product has the same design as Motorola’s design.

The “rounded octagon” patent is likely to add more grist for critics who question the wisdom of granting monopoly protection over basic shapes and concepts (14 years for design patents, 20 for regular ones). This year, a new law in the U.S. has made it easier to obtain design patents, which are cheaper and faster to get than regular patents. Meanwhile, companies like Apple continue to use a variety of other intellectual property measures like trademark, trade dress and copyright to wrap legal force fields around their products.

The new patent may provide new ammunition to Google, which owns Motorola, in its ceaseless rounds of patent litigation with Apple and other rivals in courtrooms around the world.

The patent can be seen at the United States Patent and Trademark Office. Unfortunately, the USPTO’s website only permits images to be viewed with Internet Explorer, Netscape or Opera browsers. If you’re using another browser, here’s a PDF link.

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Some companies are actually opting for prominent devices as a way to show off your connectedness, or at least not lose your gadget in the wash. But as batteries get smaller, wearables could become less of a fashion statement and more about a new wave of immersive computing.

Either way, there will be a lot of competition. ABI Research predicts that the global market for wearable computing devices in health and fitness could reach 170 million devices by 2017.

At the end of the day, the design of the wearable and how it feels on your body is only half the battle. Wearable makers are hard at work making sure their gadgets can collect the right data and deliver a service to users that makes the data important and useful in their daily lives. If the body data isn’t helpful, then really, what’s the point?

We created this “bare-bones” infographic of wearable devices that are currently available and that fit the mold for what we see as the future of the connected you: data-driven services, and unobtrusive design. Which ones do you own or want to own? Click on each body section to read more about the companies and devices available.

Google Glass

Google’s “augmented reality” glasses allow you to do anything you’d normally do on your phone or laptop — record video, find directions, message your friends — but without your hands. It’s currently available only to select “creative individuals” in colors Charcoal, Tangerine, Shale, Cotton and Sky and perhaps soon in more attractive styles. ($1,500)

Watches

A number of companies including Motorola, Pebble and Basis Science have all thrown their hats in the connected watch arena. Adding new purpose to a time-warn accessory, these smart watches read texts out loud, play music, and track your exercise and health — in addition to telling time. Apple is even working on a watch that could run iOS. ($115-$300) 

Bracelets

Companies like Jawbone  and Fitbit are marrying data and design for a wearable computing experience that’s seamless and attractive. Their wristbands and bracelets are being used to track fitness, sleep and calories but look like a simple accessory.  ($99-$129)

Jewelry

Sensors are the essential part of all wearable devices. Companies like Misfit and its Shine device use sensors that can also function as jewelry for a seamless way to track your activity. A recent Apple filing shows the company might have even broader ambitions for wearable sensors, too. ($59-$99)

Shoes

Thinkstock

From connected shoes to connected clips and inserts, feet are often the preferred place for activity trackers that show where and how far you’ve run. ($ price varies on technology)

Disclosure: Fitbit is backed by True Ventures, a venture capital firm that is an investor in the parent company of this blog, Giga Omni Media. Om Malik, founder of Giga Omni Media, is also a venture partner at True.

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What intrigues me most about the images is speaker above the 8-inch display, which is expected to have a 1280 x 800 resolution.

That means the tablet is likely to have voice capabilities like a phone, although I don’t anticipate many to hold this slab to their head. It would work in a pinch, meaning you didn’t want to have a speakerphone conversation and didn’t have a wired or wireless headset handy.

Bear in mind that the original 7-inch Galaxy Tab had cellular voice capabilities, but here in the US, that feature was stripped out of the device for all 3G models.

If Samsung does out a new note at this size, the S-Pen and multiwindow software features could increase appeal. The company already supports these on the 5.5-inch Galaxy Note 2 and, after a recent software update, on the larger Galaxy Note 10.1 tablet.

Speaking of software, I stumbled upon a handy app for Androids that helps determine the best cellular and Wi-Fi network near your location. Called OpenSignal 2, the free app uses crowdsourced information to create maps for coverage and speed, while also using a compass-like function to find the nearest Wi-Fi hotspots. OpenSignal 2 also keeps track of your mobile broadband usage and provides a speed testing feature too.

Late this past week, I started speculating on why it’s time for Google to make a smart watch. As the recent sales success of the Pebble e-paper smart watch shows — the product topped 80,000 backers on Kickstarter alone — there’s some consumer interest in wearable devices such as these.

Google actually already has a smart watch by proxy: It owns Motorola, which makes the MotoActv; perhaps one of the best Android-compatible watches on the market. It wouldn’t take much for Google to tweak or improve it. If the company is serious about wearable devices and quantified self gadgets, I’d think it could launch a revamped smart watch as early as this year’s Google I/O event.

If the company does so and gets even a small percent of Android device owners to use such a smart watch, it could gain access to tens of millions of  health-related data points such as steps taken, calories burned, heart rate. And as we already know: Google is all about gathering, indexing and using data.

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Hello Moto

I’m talking about the Motorola MotoActv, the part smart watch, part exercise tracker that I bought nearly a year ago. Although Google has kept Motorola as a separate business division since purchasing the company in 2011, for all intents and purposes, whatever Motorola makes is a Google product. The watch also runs a highly customized version of Android. In fact, its been one of the most stable Android devices I’ve ever used.

I originally bought the watch to track my running activities because it’s ideal for that. Inside the watch are various sensors and radios including: Wi-Fi, GPS, Bluetooth, and accelerometer. Flash storage of 8 or 16 GB adds room for music tracks which can be listened to through wired or wireless headphones. The software also supports my golf habit, tracking my scores, shots and providing detailed distance to the pin or to various golf hazards.

Later, I began wearing the watch every day when Motorola added support for the companion Android app for handsets built by other manufacturers. All of a sudden, my exercise tracker started notifying me of incoming messages, mail, tweets and upcoming calendar events. And it works well. Google could easily advance the device, features and software because it has a solid product to start with.

More data required, please

The second reason I wouldn’t be surprised to see a Google smart watch? The company really isn’t yet part of the wearable device market that’s gathering steam. Yes, Google’s Project Glass is entry here, but at $1,500 for a developer edition, it’s not a consumer device yet. It will take time before these high-tech glasses appear on retail shelves, if they ever do. And even if they do, they’re not likely to be part of the “quantified self” concept; a watch like the MotoActv is because it captures personal data such as steps taken, calories burned and more.

That reason alone is a good one for Google to design such a device. The company thrives on gathering and aggregating the world’s data but it really doesn’t have a good hook into health data. Even if Google could sell a smart watch to just 10 percent of Android devices owners, it would have access to quantified self data of over 50 million individuals in year, based on the 1.5 million Android devices that are activated every day. That’s some big data.

Since Google could easily build off of the existing MotoActv watch, I don’t think it would take too much time or effort to improve the device quickly. I wouldn’t be surprised at all if we see a Google smart watch at this year’s Google I/O event, in fact. Time will tell, of course.

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And the defendants? Everyone, really: Apple, Google, Motorola, RIM, HTC, Sony, LG, NEC Casio, Pantech, Kyocera, ZTE, Sprint, AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile and MetroPCS. All of them have committed the mortal sin of allowing their mobile phones to function as mobile phones. So far, so trollish. But the interesting thing about this particular suit is the origin of the suit – or, more precisely, the reporting around that origin.

U.S. Patent No. 5,491,834 comes from BT, or British Telecom as it was once known. Filed in 1993 and granted in 1996, the patent is still listed by the USPTO as belonging to BT. In its court filings (the Motorola/Google example is here), Steelhead notes that it “owns all rights of recovery under the ‘834 Patent, including the exclusive right to recover for past infringement”.

Yet there have still been several reports of this being a case of BT “aggressively monetizing” its patent portfolio. That’s not entirely without foundation – BT has sued Google over alleged patent infringement in Android – but it seems a bit unfair to go blaming the company this time.

Indeed, BT has a pretty firm line on what’s going on here, if you ask them:

“BT sold all of its rights to the patents last year. We have no involvement in Steelhead Licensing LLC’s litigation activity.”

And, just to drive it home, a BT spokesperson also told me that “BT doesn’t share in Steelhead’s licensing income”.

So, will Steelhead’s action succeed? The patent’s origins are certainly as respectable as any software patent can be (i.e. not very much, at least in my opinion), but what it describes is very common. It’s rather tricky to have a mobile phone work to an adequate standard if it can’t choose which cell to connect to. This is not something you can easily work around.

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The X Phone, as it’s currently dubbed, could have some unique features to make it stand out from the crowded smartphone market. Reports suggest a possible bendable display, ceramics for the casing and some type of gesture recognition. After the release of such a phone, Google is expected to offer an X Tablet. If the news is accurate, I’d expect these “X” products to be introduced at Google’s next annual I/O developer conference, scheduled for May 15 to 17 next year.

While waiting for an X Tablet, current Android slates haven’t had a version of Flipboard to call their own until now. This week, a tablet-optimized version of the popular news reading application appeared in the Google Play store. It’s surprising that it took so long for this app to appear on tablets, mainly because the reading experience of the magazine-style is well suited for larger screens. Indeed, the app debuted in 2010 on Apple’s iPad and later found its way to smaller screens.

Bigger screens are the current trend, however, and not just for tablets. Samsung is leveraging its Galaxy brand for a new low-cost phone with 5-inch display. The Galaxy Grand only has an 800 x 480 screen resolution, but does include a dual-core processor, 8 GB of internal storage, full gigabyte of memory and support for 21 Mbps 3G networks. Support for two SIM cards indicate that Samsung is looking to bring the large screen experience to Asia and Africa at a relatively low price point; something that can help the manufacturer stay at or near the top of Android sales in those regions.

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Cisco has hired a banker to peddle the networking giant’s Linksys wireless router business, while Google has been shopping the set-top box business it acquired when it purchased Motorola in May. The business motivation behind these sales contain insights about how television services are delivered in the home and present an opportunity that ISPs could take advantage of if they want to keep customers hooked on their boxes in order to maintain a device inside the consumer’s premise.

Most people are aware that their TVs, their gaming consoles, their Blu-Ray players and an assortment of other devices are now able to deliver content from a widening array of services such as Netflix, Hulu or Amazon. From a practical standpoint, this means consumers may find their entertainment centers less cluttered with Rokus, Boxee Boxes or maybe even a dedicated Blu-Ray player. This means consumers can get rid of myriad boxes, but the question is whether or not they will ever see the end of the set top box provided by their cable provider.

Some analysts, and even a few cable execs believe this day is coming. Already pay TV providers are eying channel guides and video on demand shows in the cloud instead of on a box. The set-top box in most cases provides three things, authentication, channel guides and a hard drive to store content. But as cable providers look for more interactive channel guides or recommendation technology, moving those off the box makes sense. Meanwhile Comcast has aggressively been moving toward streaming of its on-demand shows to meet customer’s demands to watch content on any device.

Better Wi-Fi could be an ISP selling point

And that brings us to the opportunity that ISPs are missing. While Cisco may see the Linksys business as played out, I think the idea of better home Wi-Fi is finally here and ISPs are the ones who could provide it. Many Americans get their wireless routers from their ISPs integrated as part of the modem. This made the Linksys (or any other) routers less of a necessity over time (although I can still remember hiding mine in the early days of Wi-Fi when the cable repair man came over because my provider charged a $10 Wi-Fi fee for customers bold or tech savvy enough to use their own router). However, I still don’t use the integrated Wi-Fi router that comes standard in my cable modem, because it’s terrible.

And therein lies the opportunity for ISPs. They need to build better Wi-Fi into routers and advanced controls so users can tweak their networks for their own usage — especially for video sent over home Wi-Fi networks. Then, ISPs will get the advantage of having a certified box inside a customer’s home, even as those boxes are integrated into software and cloud-based services.

Even though ISPs may love the cloud and the cool features it provides on the set top box, and even though they might no longer see a need for caching content inside the home to offset some of the demands on the last mile network, they still want a presence in the consumer home. They may call it the modem or the set-top box or a gateway, but they want a place to manage the flows of packets and deliver the quality of service customers expect. Without that box, they may as well be dumb pipes.

What boxes and features do you really need?

So, let’s see better routers. For example, a year ago Time Warner cable installed a combo modem/router in my home that offers 802.11n, but with 802.11a/c routers hitting the market this past year that support faster data rates in the 5GHz band for things like video, it’s worth looking at an upgrade. However, the life of ISP consumer equipment can be long, which means if I used that modem and router I’d be stuck using technology that will likely mean my Netflix viewing pixelates when more than one of us are watching a show.

Another option for telcos are services such as the one ASSIA provides to DSL users. The company’s new Wi-Fi Management product was released in October, and helps ensure a better Wi-Fi experience in the home by managing the throughput of the networks in the home and back to the telco’s central office. That’s a service worth having, and if Time Warner offered it I might actually use its router (ASSIA right now can only offer the access line support for telcos deploying its DSL tech).

So maybe the company that decides to buy Linksys can see if there’s a market for selling service providers better Wi-Fi routers along with their modems. Because otherwise, as integration on the consumer hardware side continues, ISPs might end up seeing their presence in the home dwindle down to a basic modem — or worse, a coaxial or DSL jack in the wall.

No wonder Google doesn’t want to be in the business.

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