Leading telecom gear manufacturer Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd. has rejected the accusations of its rival ZTE Corp., which claimed that Huawei copied its camera technology and threatened to file a lawsuit.
A statement released by Huawei on April 23, Thursday, said: "Huawei has never used the patents mentioned in our competitor's lawyers' letter and therefore we contest the allegations made against us. We stringently respect others' IPR (intellectual property rights) and protect our own IPR."
The Global Times reported that lawyers at Guangdong Guanghe Law Firm, who represent ZTE, said in a letter dated April 21 that Huawei violated ZTE's camera-focusing patents with the Honor X2 and high-end P8 smartphones that Huawei released recently.
In a letter published on the Weibo of its Nubia smartphone brand, ZTE said that "given Huawei's large-scale copying, we feel it's time to come out and use legal means to protect orderly and fair market competition."
According to the report, the patent battles among smartphone manufacturers in China are expected to intensify following Qualcomm, Inc.'s settlement with Chinese antitrust regulators.
The report said that the settlement had invalidated the cross-licensing agreements that allow Qualcomm customers such as ZTE and Huawei access to each other's portfolios and saved them from litigation.
The report added that ZTE anticipated the dissolution of the Qualcomm patent truce, and continued to seek patent royalties from its Chinese rivals over the past year.
The Global Times said that many industry experts had expected big firms such as Huawei and ZTE to seek royalties from smaller companies, but few did not foresee the two to collide head-on.
In 2014, a U.N. patent agency declared Huawei as the world's No. 1 applicant for patent applications, while ZTE only got third place.