On June 5438+1October 10, 2002, many negotiations between China Electronic Audio Industry Association (CAIA) and 6C Alliance on joint license of DVD patent broke down. Soon, the customs of some countries in the European Union seized the DVD products exported from China to the European Union on the grounds that the DVD production enterprises in China had not obtained the intellectual property certification.
On March 8th, 2002, the 6C Alliance led by Toshiba issued an ultimatum to more than one DVD enterprise of China Electronic Audio Industry Association (CAIA) in China 100: China manufacturers must reach an agreement with the 6C Alliance on patent royalties before March1year, otherwise the 6C Alliance will bring a lawsuit to the court. The condition of 6C Alliance is that the royalty will be charged at 20% of the unit price of the product, which is about $20 per set. But for China enterprises, if the patent cost of $20 is included in the supply price of products exported to overseas markets, domestic DVD will definitely lose its competitive advantage in price.
In 2002, the Association finally reached an understanding with the 6C Alliance on the licensing of DVD players, and signed the relevant agreement in April 2009. At this point, the DVD patent dispute that lasted for about two years came to an end.
On September 5th, 2003, 6C Alliance announced that it would license the core patents of DVD audio and recordable DVD products worldwide from September, 2004 1, and start collecting patent fees from June, 2004 1.
In April, 2004, at the 95th Canton Fair, 6C Alliance provided the China Chamber of Commerce for Import and Export of Mechanical and Electrical Products and the Complaint Station of the Conference with a list of more than 30 China enterprises accused of infringing their patent rights. These multinational companies retroactively charged 2.7 billion yuan. In the days that followed, every time a DVD was sold in China, DVD manufacturers in China had to pay patent fees of 13 US dollars to the patentees such as "6C Alliance", "3C Alliance" and "MPEG LA", and exported 210.3 US dollars.
Since March 2005 1, the 6C alliance has revised the patent licensing project on a global scale, providing more choices for licensees in patent licensing methods and "reducing the patent fees of some products". This price adjustment is the first "price reduction" since the establishment of the alliance. At that time, in the international market, the average price of each DVD was around $30, but this price reduction was only a drop in the bucket for China enterprises.