"1. There are two applications before the Court by Philips, as claimant and patentee, in this action against three sets of defendants: The Oppo defendants (which are defendants 1 and 2), the OnePlus defendants (defendants 3-6), and the RealMe defendants (defendants 7-9). 2. The action is in familiar form, in the sense that Philips asserts three patents (EP(UK) 1,623,511; 1,999,874 and 3,020,043) which are said to be, and have been declared, essential to one or more of the 3G or 4G standards and therefore infringed by various mobile devices conforming to those standards sold by or at the behest of each set of defendants in the UK, as detailed in the Particulars of Infringement. 3. The relief which Philips seeks is fairly standard for this type of SEP FRAND action. It is to be expected that the defences to these claims for infringement of the patents will involve claims that one or more of the patents is invalid, and obviously counterclaims for invalidity have to be heard by this court. 4. It is now conventional in this type of SEP FRAND case for the Court to manage the action into one or more technical trials, followed by a FRAND trial to determine the terms on which the patentee's SEP portfolio should be licensed."
"Until the end of the Action HP-2022-000010 (including any appeals) the Respondents undertake to give the Applicant 7 days’ notice before they, whether by their directors, officers, partners, employees or agents, or in any other way, seek any relief from the PRC" -- that is People's Republic of China -- "courts that would restrain, prevent, require the withdrawal of, or seek to penalise the Applicant for pursuing the Action in the UK. For the avoidance of doubt, this undertaking does not extend to requiring the Respondents tonotify the Applicant in advance of initiating a rate-setting action in the PRC Courts to determine the FRAND rates of a licence between them."
"Until after the return date or further order of the Court, the Respondent, whether by its directors, officers, partners, employees or agents, or in any other way, must not seek any relief from a foreign court or tribunal that would interfere with, restrain, prevent, require the withdrawal of, or seek to penalise the Applicant for pursuing the Claim herein, or taking any step in relation to the Claim, including, without limitation, pursuing the Applications or any application to be made at the return date."
"3. Since Unwired Planet[2020] UKSC 37 it has been clear that the English court is prepared to set FRAND terms for a global SEP portfolio, not just for a SEP holder's UK portfolio. The English court is not the only jurisdiction which will do this. The courts of the People's Republic of China ('PRC') will also set global terms (see Sharp v OPPO). There is a potential for inconsistent determinations therefore and questions as to the correct approach to managing such potential parallel litigation are before the Court of Appeal this week (Nokia v OPPO on appeal from[2021] EWHC 2952 (Pat) with the Judge's permission). 4. Actual or potential concurrent proceedings on the same or similar subject matter in England and abroad may be undesirable from a costs perspective but are not of themselves regarded as an attack on the English court and the overseas proceedings may not be restrained by injunction. In the present context in particular, the risk of there being conflicting judgments from different courts is acknowledged to be an unfortunate consequence of the industry's decision to establish international standard setting organisations such as ETSI (Unwired Planet (above) [90]; Nokia v OPPO (above) [116])."
"It is understood that (at least) the courts of the Netherlands, France and USA will do so as well." "
"As a result of Philip's current position, the outline of OPPO's opposition to the Injunction is as follows: (1) The Injunction should be set aside ab initio because of material lack of full and frank disclosure at the without notice hearing. (a) The Injunction was sought quia timet but Mellor J was not referred to the relevant legal threshold requirements. (b) Mellor J was not referred to significant material demonstrating that OPPO had no intention to apply for anti-suit relief in PRC or elsewhere. (c) The fact that the Injunction was intended to apply worldwide was not drawn to Mellor J's attention. There was neither evidence nor submission on the point. (d) The meaning of the words "interfere with" (which Philips now asserts preclude the enforcement in PRC of a PRC judgment (or even, e.g., a French judgment in France)), was not addressed in evidence or submissions. Indeed it was not even put before the Court until Philips' Reply evidence for the current application. (e) Further, there was no basis for an order of this sort (i.e. to bar enforcement of a judgment in proceedings which had not even been begun to have been sought) on an urgent, without notice, basis. But neither point was addressed. (2) The Injunction, having been set aside ab initio, should not be re-granted. (3) The Injunction should not be continued because now that OPPO have had the opportunity to file their own evidence it is beyond doubt that they have no intention of applying for anti-suit relief. Further, OPPO have offered an unequivocal undertaking not to do so without notice (which Philips has refused to accept). (4) Alternatively, the Injunction sought should not be continued in the terms sought. (a) The words 'interfere with' should be removed because: (i) they would (on Philips' case) impose an illegitimate restraint on legitimate parallel proceedings; (ii) there is no evidence that OPPO would (or could at any proximate date) seek to enforce a hypothetical future PRC judgment PRC proceedings have not even been started; and (iii) if they are not the restraint for which Philips contends they are confusing surplusage. (b) There was and is no basis for the Injunction to apply worldwide."
"... the mere fact that the English court refused a stay of English proceedings on the ground of forum non conveniens did not itself justify the grant of an injunction to restrain foreign proceedings. The doctrine of comity requires restraint since (a) another jurisdiction may take the view that the courts of that jurisdiction are an equally (or even more) appropriate forum than the English court and (b) any anti-suit injunction can be perceived as an, at least indirect, interference with such foreign court."
"It is difficult, and would probably be unwise, to seek to define the expression 'unconscionable conduct' in anything like an exhaustive manner. In my opinion, however, it includes, at any rate, conduct which is oppressive or vexatious or which interferes with the due process of the court."
"29. Gee, Commercial Injunctions, 6th ed (2016), para 2-035 similarly, suggests that the circumstances in which a quia timet injunction will be granted are relatively flexible: 'There is no fixed or "absolute" standard for measuring the degree of apprehension of a wrong which must be shown in order to justify quia timet relief. The graver the likely consequences, the more the court will be reluctant to consider the application as "premature"
'29. The court has an undoubted jurisdiction to grant injunctive relief on a quia timet basis when that is necessary in order to prevent a threatened or apprehended act of nuisance. But because this kind of relief ordinarily involves an interference with the rights and property of the defendant and may (as in this case) take a mandatory form requiring positive action and expenditure, the practice of the court has necessarily been to proceed with caution and to require to be satisfied that the risk of actual damage occurring is both imminent and real. That is particularly so when, as in this case, the injunction sought is a permanent injunction at trial rather than an interlocutory order granted on American Cyanamid principles having regard to the balance of convenience. A permanent injunction can only be granted if the claimant has proved at the trial that there will be an actual infringement of his rights unless the injunction is granted. ‘30. A much-quoted formulation of this principle is set out in the judgment of Pearson J in Fletcher v Bealey(1884) 28 Ch D 688 at 698 where he first quotes from Mellish LJ in Salvin v North Brancepeth Coal Company (1874) LR 9 Ch App 705 and then adds his own comments that: "It is not correct to say, as a strict proposition of law, that, if the plaintiff has not sustained, or cannot prove that he has sustained, substantial damage, this court will give no relief; because, of course, if it could be proved that the plaintiff was certainly about to sustain very substantial damage by what the defendant was doing, and there was no doubt about it, this court would at once stop the defendant, and would not wait until the substantial damage had been sustained. But in nuisance of this particular kind, it is known by experience that unless substantial damage has actually been sustained, it is impossible to be certain that substantial damage ever will be sustained, and, therefore, with reference to this particular description of nuisance, it becomes practically correct to lay down the principle, that, unless substantial damage is proved to have been sustained, this court will not interfere. I do not think, therefore, that I shall be very far wrong if I lay it down that there are at least two necessary ingredients for a quia timet action. There must, if no actual damage is proved, be proof of imminent danger, and there must also be proof that the apprehended damage will, if it comes, be very substantial. I should almost say it must be proved that it will be irreparable, because, if the danger is not proved to be so imminent that no one can doubt that, if the remedy is delayed, the damage will be suffered, I think it must be shewn that, if the damage does occur at any time, it will come in such a way and under such circumstances that it will be impossible for the plaintiff to protect himself against it if relief is denied to him in a quia timet action.’ 31. More recently in Lloyd v Symonds[1998] EWCA Civ 511 (a case involving nuisance caused by noise) Chadwick LJ said: "On the basis of the judge’s finding that the previous nuisance had ceased at the end of May 1996 the injunction which he granted on7 January 1997 was quia timet. It was an injunction granted, not to restrain anything that the defendants were doing (then or at the commencement of the proceedings on20 June 1996 ), but to restrain something which (as the plaintiff alleged) they were threatening or intending to do. Such an injunction should not, ordinarily, be granted unless the plaintiff can show a strong probability that, unless restrained, the defendant will do something which will cause the plaintiff irreparable harm — that is to say, harm which, if it occurs, cannot be reversed or restrained by an immediate interlocutory injunction and cannot be adequately compensated by an award for damages. There will be cases in which the court can be satisfied that, if the defendant does what he is threatening to do, there is so strong a probability of an actionable nuisance that it is proper to restrain the act in advance rather than leave the plaintiff to seek an immediate injunction once the nuisance has commenced. '
"15. I am informed by Jack Peng, that, although the First Respondent did seek an anti-suit injunction against Sharp, it has not sought anti-suit relief in any court since and neither it nor any associated company has any intention to do so again; i.e. they have no intention to apply to the courts for anti-suit style relief so as to preclude parallel patent infringement lawsuits linked to FRAND of the sort being pursued by Philips in this case (or, indeed, other claimants such as Nokia and InterDigital in England - see further below). My firm drew this lack of intention to the attention of Philips in a letter of30 May 2022 (pages 1-2 of Exhibit PJB-1). 16. Again, Mr Peng informs me that since the Sharp case if the First Respondent (or associated companies) considers that the more appropriate forum to hear proceedings initiallycommenced in another jurisdiction is the PRC courts (where its business is predominantly based), its practice is to approach that issue by challenging the jurisdiction of any non-PRCcourt using the processes and procedures of that non-PRC court. This is evident from the Mitsubishi, Nokia and InterDigital claims which have been issued against some of theRespondents in this jurisdiction more recently (on23 April 2019 ,1 July 2021 and20 December 2021 respectively)."
"A contractual undertaking was considered to be satisfactory in Caterpillar Logistics Services (UK) Ltd v de Crean[2012] EWCA Civ 156 ,[2012] 3 All ER 129 (Stanley Burnton LJ), [67]."