Düsseldorf, June 3, 2025 – Patents and technology standards play a key role in Europe’s digital development. This was found by a recent study carried out by the European Patent Office (EPO). Based on more than 5.5 million documents from standards development organizations (SDOs), the EPO was able to establish a clear link between patents and standards. A new EPO dataset links 170,000 SDO documents with patents and shows that SDO sources are now cited in 37 percent of patents declared as standard essential (SEPs).
SEPs serve as the basis for central standards that are frequently used in high-speed mobile communications, smart home devices and streaming, among other things. The technologies protected by SEPs create markets for technologies that significantly impact our everyday lives today. “As such, they are also of huge importance when it comes to industrial competitiveness and economic growth in Europe. In view of rapid technological advancement, for example in the field of artificial intelligence, SEPs will play an increasingly important role in the future,” says Gottfried Schüll, patent attorney and partner at Cohausz & Florack (C&F). The law firm has regularly represented SEP holders since 2000 – currently, for example, in proceedings against Microsoft over the use of video coding SEPs – and has been successful in more than 750 lawsuits before the world’s leading German and European patent courts so far.
The EPO study also highlights the importance of the Unified Patent Court (UPC), which has established itself as the preferred venue for SEP disputes since opening its doors on June 1, 2023. According to the EPO, 23 SEP-related cases were heard by the UPC within 19 months – more than a third of all such cases ruled on in Europe since the court was founded. The UPC’s Patent Mediation and Arbitration Centre, which is set to open at the end of 2025, also aims to promote the out-of-court settlement of global SEP disputes.
“The UPC has already met expectations in just a short period of time,” says Gottfried Schüll. The German UPC judges, who bring experience from numerous proceedings before the German patent litigation chambers, play a particularly important role in the successful assertion of SEPs: “They make a crucial contribution to ensuring Europe’s excellent position for SEP disputes.”
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