AVS IPR Policy

Developed in 2004 by an International team of patent licensing experts and patent attorneys

  • Representatives from the consumer, communication and computer industries
  • Representatives from the semiconductor and consumer product market segments

Low Risk Innovation Model: build up the licensing model before standardization

  • All proponents who would like to propose technologies to AVS, shall disclose their patents and declare their licensing commitment
    • e.g. ”RAND Royalty-Fee" or "Agree to join in the patent pool".

AVS standards are explicitly designed to use the technologies from AVS member only, or use royalty free technologies

Simple Licensing Model:

  • One patent pool
  • One-stop licensing model
  • 1RMB per device for hardware decoder (AVS1/AVS+/AVS2 Patent Pools)
  • Annual royalty cap; Fixed Annual Fee option (AVS1/AVS+/AVS2 Patent Pools)
  • Royalty free for software decoder in Internet applications (AVS1/AVS+/AVS2 Patent Pools)
  • Royalty free for content (AVS1/AVS+/AVS2 Patent Pools)

In China, the royalty fees of AVS1/AVS+/AVS2 are 1RMB per hardware device

AVS3 Licensing terms and conditions are not available now; AVS3 patent pool was kicked off in Aug, 2020

Up-Front Commitment to AVS IPR Policy

AVS Members sign the AVS Member Agreement which includes the IPR policy

Article 6 of Member Agreement IPR Policy

Up-Front Commitment to License

Contributed technology to a specific standard
No contribution of other party’s technology

Article 6

Disclosure obligation

  • RAND-RF & AVS Pool default :
    • Good faith disclosure of patents and published applications with necessary claims
  • RAND default:
    • Patents, published applications and unpublished applications

Articles 14-16

Up-Front Default Licensing Obligation

Participant in a subgroup:

  • RAND-RF (Most Favorable)
  • AVS Pool (Most Favorable)
  • RAND

Non-participant

  • Also No-License

Articles 11, 12, 14

IPR preference for adopting technology contributions

Minimize necessary patent claims
Most favorable license terms

Articles 9, 13

Disclosure information

  • Patent holder/applicant name
  • Patent/application number
  • Existence of unpublished application

Articles 16

Review Period

  • 90 days
  • Protection from 3rd-party contributed technology

Article 18

Reciprocity

  • No obligation toward non-committing member

Article 17

Independent Licensing

  • Retention of independent licensing rights

Article 20

Transfer

  • No circumvention
  • Licensing obligations survive

Article 22