Patent Assertion Entity Activity

Figure 4.5: Relative Proportion of Wireless Patent Licenses
Note: Figure depicts 1,003 licenses relating to wireless patents.
In general, patent licenses are contracts that allow a third party to use a patent holder’s patents under
certain conditions, often in exchange for payment. As noted in Chapter 3, Litigation PAE licenses
tended to use relatively simple license terms. For example, the typical Litigation PAE license did not
include any geographic or field-of-use restrictions and called for only a lump-sum royalty payment.
Table 4.2 compares some characteristics of licenses related to wireless patents by Wireless Respondent
type. The first three columns of Table 4.2 show the percentage of licenses by Wireless Respondent type
that contained a given license term, and the final three columns summarize payment terms.
116