Tech
China’s Huawei renews patent licensing deal with Ericsson
Chinese telecoms giant Huawei said Friday it had renewed a licensing agreement with Ericsson to use each other’s technologies, in a rebuff to US warnings about the risk of espionage by Beijing.
Huawei has been at the centre of an intense technological rivalry between China and the United States, which suspects the company of spying for Beijing – accusations Huawei denies.
US sanctions on Huawei since 2019 have cut off the firm from global supply chains for American components and hobbled its smartphone arm, forcing it to pivot towards other forms of growth.
Washington has also pressured its allies to ban the use of Huawei gear in their 5G telecoms networks, arguing that Beijing could use the equipment to spy on other countries’ communications and data traffic.
Despite those tensions, Huawei and Ericsson – based in Stockholm – have signed a “long-term” global agreement to licence each other’s patents, the Chinese company said in a statement Friday.
The deal covers patents essential to 3G, 4G and 5G cellular technologies as well as both companies’ “respective sales of network infrastructure and consumer devices”, Huawei said.
The company’s intellectual property chief, Alan Fan, said the agreement “demonstrates the commitment both parties have forged that intellectual property should be properly respected and protected”.
“Our commitment to sharing leading technological innovations will drive healthy, sustainable industry development and provide consumers with more robust products and services,” he said.
The previous such agreement between Huawei and Ericsson was signed in 2016.
Back then, Huawei was an insurgent force in the global technology sector with an eye on dethroning Apple and Samsung as the world’s top seller of smartphones.
It briefly grabbed that title in 2020 but US sanctions have since clipped its wings and forced Huawei into a strategic refocus on software, connected devices, business computing, smart vehicles and other sectors.
Despite being sidelined from American technologies, Huawei could begin producing its own chips for 5G phones this year, according to media reports about which the company has refused to comment.
OpenAI and Japanese conglomerate SoftBank (9984.T) will each commit $19 billion to fund Stargate, a joint venture to develop data centers for artificial intelligence in the U.S., the Information reported on Wednesday.
The ChatGPT maker will hold a 40% interest in Stargate, and would act as an extension of OpenAI, the report said, citing OpenAI CEO Sam Altman speaking to colleagues. His comments imply SoftBank would also have a 40% interest, the report added.
OpenAI and SoftBank did not immediately respond to Reuters’ requests for comment.
On Tuesday, U.S. President Donald Trump announced that OpenAI, SoftBank Group and Oracle (ORCL.N) will unveil Stargate and invest $500 billion over the next four years to help the United States stay ahead of China and other rivals in the global AI race.
Stargate will initially deploy $100 billion and the rest of the funding is expected over the next four years. The project is being led by SoftBank and OpenAI.
Taiwan’s HTC (2498.TW) said on Thursday it will sell part of its unit for extended reality (XR) headsets and glasses to Google (GOOGL.O) for $250 million and transfer some of its employees to the U.S. company.
The transaction is expected to close in the first quarter of this year, HTC said.
The two companies will also explore further collaboration opportunities, HTC added.
Google said in a separate statement that the deal will accelerate the development of the Android XR platform and strengthen the ecosystem for headsets and glasses.
Lu Chia-te, HTC vice president and general counsel, told reporters the company had granted its intellectual property rights to Google as a non-exclusive license.
“Therefore, this is not a buyout nor an exclusive licence. In the future, HTC will still retain the ability to use, utilise, and even further develop it without any restrictions,” he said.
Microsoft’s (MSFT.O) LinkedIn has been sued by Premium customers who said the business-focused social media platform disclosed their private messages to third parties without permission to train generative artificial intelligence models.
According to a proposed class action filed on Tuesday night on behalf of millions of LinkedIn Premium customers, LinkedIn quietly introduced a privacy setting last August that let users enable or disable the sharing of their personal data.
Customers said LinkedIn then discreetly updated its privacy policy on Sept. 18 to say data could be used to train AI models, and in a “frequently asked questions” hyperlink said opting out “does not affect training that has already taken place.”
This attempt to “cover its tracks” suggests LinkedIn was fully aware it violated customers’ privacy and its promise to use personal data only to support and improve its platform, in order to minimize public scrutiny and legal fallout, the complaint said.
The lawsuit was filed in the San Jose, California, federal court on behalf of LinkedIn Premium customers who sent or received InMail messages, and whose private information was disclosed to third parties for AI training before Sept. 18.
It seeks unspecified damages for breach of contract and violations of California’s unfair competition law, and $1,000 per person for violations of the federal Stored Communications Act.
A lawyer for Prince Harry on Wednesday said the Duke of Sussex had reached a settlement with Rupert Murdoch’s news conglomerate.
LinkedIn said in a statement: “These are false claims with no merit.”
A lawyer for the plaintiffs had no immediate additional comment.
The lawsuit was filed several hours after U.S. President Donald Trump announced a joint venture among Microsoft-backed OpenAI, Oracle (ORCL.N) and SoftBank (9984.T), with a potential $500 billion of investment, to build AI infrastructure in the United States.
OpenAI, SoftBank each commit 19bn dollars to Stargate AI data center
Taiwan’s HTC to sell part of XR unit to Google for 250mn dollars
Microsoft’s LinkedIn sued for disclosing customer information to train AI models
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