ITU-T Forum Summit 2003

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ITU-T Forum Summit 2003
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IPR and StandardizationIMTC Viewpoint

• Dr. Istvan Sebestyen
• IMTC President

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Outline

• Anything wrong with the current IPR policies of
  SDOs?
• IMTCs IPR-related activities
• Setting IPR requirements
• Promotion of licensing
• IMTCs IPR relevant Historical Archive
• Conclusions

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Standardization Faces a Crisis

• Many modern standards face a very complex IPR
  environment
• Many claimants, unclear situations
• Licensing difficulties delay market deployment (4
  years)
• Major approved standards have problems
• Many are questioning survival of the
  standardization process

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Market Acceptance is Becoming a Real Problem

• Standards are not working anymore
• Too many claimed IPR holders (sometimes 50)
• Lots of valid IPR, hard to determine owners
• Often too expensive
• Unrealistic licensing schemes
• Impossible to get all licenses (too many IP
  holders)
• Total cost is unpredictable
• IPR raiders (weak or invalid claims) try to
  exploit the chaos
• Consequence Market movement toward proprietary
  solutions

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Increasing Dangerous Trend

• Many in industry are questioning if
  standardization is still practical
• A perception of breakdown in the process
• Examples
• ISO/IEC MPEG-1, MPEG-2, MPEG-4
• ITU-T G.723.1, G.729 speech codecs
• ITU-T H.261, H.263 video codecs
• ITU-T T.81 ISO/IEC 10914 JPEG-1
• ITU-T H.264 MPEG4-10 (JVT) hopefully not

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Something wrong with theSDO IPR Policies?

• Fundamental assumptions of the classical IPR
  policies are shaking
• Including
• One size fits all policy works for all
  standards
• All SDOs must have similar/same policies
• Technical and IPR work must be separated
• Licensing strictly outside the scope of SDO
• Voluntary gentleman like behaviour of actors
  assumed, no Standards Police needed

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Traditional SDO Policies Inadequate

• Traditional IPR policy doesnt work for very
  complex IPR situations
• One policy doesnt fit all standards
• Different SDOs can have different policies
• Technical and IPR work may be merged
• May have to check IP claims, react technically
• Licensing can be within scope of SDO
• Sometimes necessary in complex IPR situations

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Implementation and Recordkeeping

• Voluntary implementation inadequate
• SDO Secretariat may need to take actions
• Recordkeeping, Archiving Improvements
• Must keep ALL records for future research
• Not just a subset
• Must keep permanently to prove prior art
• Good indexes, searchable text will help

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What is the solution?

• Improve SDO IPR policies
• Meet market requirements for standardization
• Deregulation, open source mean changes
• Users have many choices SDOs must compete
• If standards fail, participation will disappear
• Only SDOs with successful IP policies will
  survive
• Necessary, but a difficult challenge!
• Affected fora can assist in some areas

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What IMTC is Doing

• At the start of standardization
• Formulate and communicate IPR requirements to
  SDOs
• At the end of standardization
• Initiate and sponsor the start of licensing
  activities, if needed
• Collect store relevant IPR records
• Historical information on multimedia standards
  to assist solution of IPR disputes

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Formulation of IPR Requirements

• Best example ITU-T H.264 MPEG-4 Part10
• IMTC formulated and liaised requirements to ITU-T
  and ISO/IEC MPEG
• RF Baseline for fast market breakthrough in
  real-time communication
• RAND Options e.g. for Digital TV
• Concept was accepted both by ITU and ISO/IEC
• Problem SDOs do not have appropriate policy
  tools and practice to ensure RF Baseline
  implementation (keep your finger crossed)

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Formulation of IPR Requirements (2)

• IMTC takes member input case-by-case
• IMTC may steer particular standards to the SDO
  whose IPR policy fits best
• IMTC may suggest a de-facto standard
• IMTC may define own standard
• As a last resort only

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Kick-off of Licensing

• Promote the start of licensing activities
• Allow fast implementation and market penetration
  of the standard
• Best example ITU-T H.264
• IMTC/M4IF/ISMA jointly sponsored a June 2003
  meeting (Los Angeles)
• Formulate the licensing requirements as seen by
  the users.
• Next step Licensors getting together

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Historic Archive Goals

• Central source for prior art and relevant records
  for IMTC members
• Discourage filing of invalid patents
• Clarify situation for standards committees
• Support defense against invalid patents
• Promote adoption of new technology
• Promote growth of IMTC member markets

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Dont Standards Bodies already do this?

• Standards Orgs. often dont keep records
• Their records are not kept forever
• Some documents are not archived at all
• (ITU-T Rapporteurs meeting docs, TDs, Delayed
  docs)
• Many older records on paper only
• Especially prior to 1995

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Conclusions

• Traditional IPR policies not working
• Very complex IPR environments
• Market rejecting delays, complexity
• SDOs, standardization at risk
• Improved policies needed ASAP
• Fora such as IMTC can help the situation
• Advice, choice of SDOs
• Historical archive projects

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Thank you!

• Questions?

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Background slides on the IMTCs Historical
Archive
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Historical Standards Archive

• Historical information relevant to multimedia
  technology standards
• Contents include
• ITU-T H.3xx Systems
• MPEG Systems
• H.26x G.72x T.xx (media codecs)
• Other relevant standards
• Already running with partial database

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Electronic Access (members only)

• All archives will be in electronic form
• Older paper documents will be scanned
• Available via Web/FTP
• CDs, DVDs if possible

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Data Sources

• Existing databases
• IMTC member records
• Standards Org. records
• References to existing information

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What will be Stored?

• All meeting contributions
• All meeting reports
• Lists of participants
• Records of IPR licensing declarations
• Copies of available pre-existing records
• Copies of Standards Org. patent databases
• Journal articles, brochures, conference procs.
• References to books, expired patents, etc.