The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative's annual review of countries' intellectual property practices added Canada and Columbia to a "priority watch list," as other countries remained on it including China, for 12 nations total, one more than 2017 (see 1704280059). Canada remains the only G7 country identified in the "Special 301" report and "downgrade" is amid "significant concerns" like "poor border and law enforcement with respect to counterfeit or pirated goods" and "deficient copyright protection," USTR reported. "Canada does not provide customs officials with the ability to inspect, detain, seize, and destroy in-transit counterfeit and pirated goods entering Canada destined for the United States." Canada's embassy didn't comment, nor did that of China or Colombia on Friday. Colombia should work on issues involving ISPs, USTR said. "As online piracy, particularly via mobile devices, continues to grow, Colombian law enforcement authorities with relevant jurisdiction, including the National Police and the Attorney General, have yet to conduct meaningful and sustained investigations and prosecutions against the operators of large pirate websites and mobile applications based in Colombia," it said on IP generally. China is on the priority watch list for the 14th consecutive year, USTR announced. "Longstanding and new IP concerns merit increased attention, including China’s coercive technology transfer practices, range of impediments to effective IP enforcement, and widespread infringing activity -- including trade secret theft, rampant online piracy, and counterfeit manufacturing." MPAA CEO Charles Rivkin said "American creators still face significant challenges in foreign markets protecting and enforcing their intellectual property rights, especially in the form of online piracy." The International IP Alliance noted that among 24 countries on the lower-tier "watch list" are "key markets for creators like Brazil, Mexico, Switzerland, Thailand, United Arab Emirates, and Vietnam." Added to the watch list for 2018 were the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Tajikistan, while Bulgaria was removed, a USTR representative noted. Others reacting favorably to the report were BSA|The Software Alliance and the Entertainment Software Association.

As the market transitions to 5G, “the engineering challenges embedded in the 5G opportunity play directly to Qualcomm's strengths and the focused investment we have made over the last several years,” said CEO Steve Mollenkopf on a Wednesday earnings call. “We are leading the industry to 5G and we are pleased to see the strength of our roadmap helping to enable the upcoming commercial launches of 5G networks and devices, including the 18 network operators and 20 manufacturers that have selected our X50 5G modem for trials and 5G devices.” Qualcomm will go to market on 5G with a standards-essential-patents-only licensing offering at an “effective” royalty rate of 3.25 percent for “multimode” devices compliant with the Release-15 suite of 5G specifications that 3GPP finalized in December, said Mollenkopf. Modeled after the SEP-only licensing program Qualcomm “successfully” launched in China three years ago, using the same approach for licensing 5G “facilitates the effort to conclude agreements and extensions in 2018 and early 2019, providing for a seamless transition for the launch of 5G devices in 2019,” he said. The company will continue offering its “portfolio-wide” licensing package at the higher 5 percent royalty rate, said Qualcomm Technology Licensing President Alex Rogers in Q&A. “We expect on a go-forward basis that there will be a number of licensees who are interested in extensions and renewals who may want to have SEP-only license agreements,” said Rogers. “We expect there will be a number of licensees who want to maintain portfolio-wide agreements worldwide, but there will also be licensees who want to have SEP-only agreements on a worldwide basis. And that is, of course, something that we can accommodate on a case-by-case basis.”

The Supreme Court ruled Patent and Trademark Office inter partes review (IPR) process is constitutional, in Oil States v. Greene's Energy Tuesday, drawing praise from the Computer & Communications Industry Association. The court “confirmed that [PTO] has the power to double-check its own work,” said CCIA President Ed Black: The IPR “process upheld today has made it less expensive for companies to defend themselves from abusive patent litigation and has helped strike down patents that never should have issued in the first place.” Calling IPR "the bedrock of the America Invents Act," Software & Information Industry Association CEO Ken Wasch said the ruling "upheld both the right of Congress to regulate and reform the patent system, and the ability of our members to bring challenges to poor-quality patents so they can continue to innovate without spending millions in unnecessary litigation.”

ASCAP distributed more than $1 billion to songwriter, composer and music publisher members in 2017, the performance rights group announced Thursday. With 660,000-plus members, revenue hit a record for a fourth straight year, up 8 percent as distributions grew 10 percent.

Comcast updates to its X1 system let its X1 set-top boxes fall outside the scope of an International Trade Commission limited exclusion order in November against the company (see 1711280017), Customs and Border Protection ruled March 5, recently released. Comcast has been litigating set-top patent issues with Rovi, now named TiVo, for years (see 1803150024). "Comcast has carried its burden of demonstrating that the changes made to the X1 system will prevent Comcast’s customers from using the modified X1 system, of which the STBs at issue are a component, in a manner which directly infringes," CBP ruled. The design changes, most of which are redacted in the ruling, removed some features that allowed users to remotely schedule TV program recordings. "In support of the efficacy of its redesign, Comcast produced customer complaints from its Internet forums, which Comcast assuaged by publicly explaining that the remote recording functionality had been removed," said CBP. Redesigned X1 boxes imported by Arris and Technicolor on behalf of Comcast are no longer prohibited from entry into the U.S. CBP wasn't persuaded by TiVo's claims the same infringing features remained despite Comcast's changes. Comcast thinks the ITC "reached the wrong decision in this case, and we removed the remote DVR scheduling feature at issue while we pursue an appeal," a spokeswoman said Wednesday. "The letter simply acknowledges the favorable ruling we received from Customs last month.” TiVo declined to comment.

Various models of iPhones and iPads violate three U.S. patents on fingerprint authentication technology held by South Korean company Firstface, alleged a complaint (in Pacer) filed Friday against Apple in U.S. District Court in San Francisco. One of the patents (8,831,557), issued in September 2014, was the basis of a federal complaint that Firstface also filed Friday against Samsung (see 1804140001). Two 2017 patents in the Apple complaint -- 9,633,373 granted April 25, and 9,779,419 granted Oct. 3 -- “are not at issue” in the action against Samsung, “but are in the same patent family as the '557 patent,” said Firstface lawyers in a notice of pendency (in Pacer) filed Tuesday with U.S. Magistrate Judge Joseph Spero in San Francisco. Apple didn’t comment Tuesday.

U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer should focus on securing “strong copyright provisions” in U.S. trade agreements because “robust” intellectual property protections are “essential to American innovation and economic growth,” Sens. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, and Bill Nelson, D-Fla., wrote Lighthizer Friday. “Without adequate global safeguards to combat the growing international incidence of counterfeit goods and intellectual property theft, the strength and vitality of America’s most creative and innovative sectors diminishes.” USTR didn't comment.

It’s “time for quick action” for companies that want to sway the U.S. Trade Representative’s office against imposing Trade Act Section 301 tariffs of 25 percent on 1,200 classifications of goods imported from China in the list released Tuesday (see 1804040054 or 1804040023), said DLA Piper in an "international trade alert." Companies “have the opportunity to present their views on specific products listed under the proposal for higher tariffs before the list is finalized and the tariffs become effective, in an effort to seek the removal of a product from the final list,” said the law firm Wednesday. Written comments are due May 11, with an April 23 deadline for requesting to appear at a May 15 public hearing, it said. May 22 is the deadline for written comments to “rebut statements made at the hearing,” it noted. The USTR notice spells out how someone who wants a product removed from the list should file comments and what those comments should say, said the alert: Commenters “should explain why the inclusion of the specific product will not be effective in curbing China's actions that are targeted by this Section 301 action, and also how the tariff would negatively impact US persons (including the affected company and its customers)." USTR didn't comment Thursday on whether the May 15 public hearing at the International Trade Commission building will be streamed live. The agency's recent history has been to hold hearings "off-camera." U.S.-threatened sanctions and the Chinese response to "reciprocate" are likely stage setting for future negotiations, Merrill Lynch analysts emailed investors. "Despite the exchange of tariff threats, we believe there is still room for negotiation between the US and China," said Helen Qiao and Sylvia Sheng Tuesday. "We maintain our view that China will continue its 'carrot and stick approach,' threatening retaliation but also proposing to expand its imports of US products, cut the auto duty, and ease restrictions for US companies investing and selling in China," they said. "We expect the final version of both the US and China trade measures to be more toned down."

Three weeks after HEVC Advance announced it was scrapping royalty fees on most H.265 content (see 1803140037), it welcomed 12 new members, the largest haul in its three years. They include four South Korean entities remaining in rival MPEG LA’s H.265 patent pool. Korean Broadcasting System is among three joining HEVC Advance as licensors only, as is Fraunhofer, Pete Moller, the patent pool’s CEO, emailed. Humax, another South Korean MPEG LA member, is joining as licensor and licensee, and the rest include GoPro and Western Digital, which come as licensees only, he said. "Widespread" adoption of the video compression standard is "accelerating,” the pool said Tuesday. Except for Fraunhofer, the new members were in place before the content fee cut, Moller said. “Many important companies [are] reaching out to talk that previously felt the content fees were too significant of a barrier,” said Moller. “Discussions in the best of situations take 3-6 months."

With “ever growing interest in digital media,” there's a “need to develop consumer-accessible technologies to further enhance the listening experience,” said a U.S. patent (9,930,463) Sonos landed last Tuesday. It describes methods of “defect detection via audio playback” in a multiroom home entertainment network, describing a company product for streaming within a household. A spokeswoman declined further comment Monday.