Nokia v Mala (CFI, 2 May 2024)

Date	2 May 2024
Court	CFI
Division	Paris (FR) Central Division - Seat
Type of action	Preliminary objection
Registry reference	App_8708/2024 · ORD_13023/2024
Parties	Nokia Technology GmbH v. Mala Technologies Ltd.

Official decision (PDF) · UPC registry entry

Dhenne Avocats represents claimants and defendants in European patent disputes before the Unified Patent Court, including the Paris divisions.

Contact the firm

Dhenne Avocats · 10 October 2026

Our analysis

Summary

By an order of 2 May 2024 (UPC_CFI_484/2023, ACT_595045/2023, App_8708/2024, ORD_13023/2024), the judge-rapporteur of the Paris Central Division (M. Haedicke) rejected the preliminary objection lodged by Mala Technologies Ltd. in the revocation action brought by Nokia Technology GmbH against EP 2 044 709, validated in Germany only. An earlier revocation action before the German courts, brought before the UPCA entered into force, does not bar recourse to the UPC.

Question

Do the lis pendens rules in Articles 29 to 32 of Regulation (EU) No 1215/2012 apply, directly or by analogy with Article 71c(2), where a nullity action was brought before the Federal Patent Court before the transitional period, and should the proceedings be stayed?

Decision

Article 71c(2) covers only actions brought during the transitional period. The earlier German action falls outside it (paragraphs 47 and 48). Since Articles 71a to 71d lay down a specific regime for common courts, Articles 29 to 31 do not apply directly (paragraphs 34, 38 and 39), and there is no unintended gap justifying an analogy, the risk of divergent decisions being an accepted consequence (paragraphs 51 to 57). A stay was refused in the absence of an imminent decision (paragraphs 63 to 65), lodging a preliminary objection does not justify extending the time for the Defence to revocation either (paragraphs 66 to 68). Leave to appeal was granted.

Key points for practice

Practical point: a national nullity action brought before 1 June 2023 does not block a revocation action before the Central Division, a defendant raising a preliminary objection must still meet the deadline for its defence.

Provisions applied

Agreement on a Unified Patent Court: Art. 3(c), Art. 31, Art. 32(1)(d), Art. 33(8) and (10) and Art. 83
Rules of Procedure: Rules 9.3, 19.1(a), 20, 48, 49.1 and 295
Regulation (EU) No 1215/2012: Art. 24(4), Art. 29 to 31 and 71a to 71d
European Patent Convention: Art. 64 and 65

Prepared by Dhenne Avocats from the official decision, consulted on 10 October 2026. The database is updated every week, on Friday. Only the official text is authoritative.

Going further

Lexicon: Local and central divisions (UPC).

Dhenne Avocats blog: The Transitional Period and the UPC: Coordinating Two Judicial Orders.

Publications by Matthieu Dhenne: Pleading the Long Arm: What a UPC Statement of Claim Must Carry Beyond Jurisdiction, Valeo v. Bosch and the Redistribution of Cases Within the UPC (Kluwer Patent Blog).

Source and translations

Official source: Unified Patent Court registry link recorded in the record
Original language: not recorded
Translation available: no translation recorded the firm’s French record is a summary, not a translation
Date checked: not recorded

Only the official text is authoritative. A machine translation is never presented as official, republishing a third-party document requires a verified basis in rights, and a link to the source is preferred.

Follow this case

Proceedings, related decisions, appeals, parties and patents as recorded in the registry and in the Dhenne Avocats corpus. Each link states its source.

Proceedings

No case number recorded in this record.

Parties

defendantMala Technologies Ltd.3 decisions in the corpus Follow this party
claimantNokia Technology GmbH4 decisions in the corpus Follow this party

Exact name as it appears in the record, group affiliation only where sourced and dated.

Decisions in the same proceedings and documented appeals

No other decision in the corpus bears the same case number, and no appeal is documented in the corpus to date.

What the record states

Nature of the act: Preliminary objection
Outcome (Dhenne Avocats summary): L'exception préliminaire est rejetée : les règles de litispendance du règlement n° 1215/2012 ne s'appliquent pas à une action nationale engagée avant la période transitoire, sursis et prorogation sont refusés.
Appeal: No appeal documented in the corpus, this does not mean that no appeal was lodged.
Instance: First-instance decision, whether it has become final is not recorded.

Patents mentioned

EP 2 044 709 mentioned in: Dhenne Avocats analysis Follow this patent

Related decisions cited in the analyses

Mala v Nokia (CoA, 17 September 2024) cites this decision

Scope: Dhenne Avocats corpus. Registry-based links are marked “official number”; links derived from the analyses are marked as such. An erroneous link can be withdrawn without deleting any record.

Patents and standards

Publication	Role in the dispute	Family	Standard and declaration	Pool	Sources
`EP 2 044 709`	Mentioned in the analysis (role not qualified) Also mentioned in 3 other decision(s): Mala v Nokia (CoA, 17 September 2024) · Nokia Technology v Mala Technologies (CFI, 2 July 2024) · Mala v Nokia (CoA, 21 June 2024)	not recorded	not recorded	not recorded	Espacenet links not checked mentioned in: Dhenne Avocats analysis

The statuses “asserted in litigation”, “declared essential”, “listed by a pool” and “essentiality examined by a court” are distinct and may coexist. Validity, infringement and technical essentiality are different questions. Scope: patents cited in the decisions of the Dhenne Avocats corpus, with no essentiality score or prediction.

Receive an alert

Weekly summary of new records and substantive updates matching what you follow. Address confirmed by email, unsubscribe at any time, one email per week even where several of your follows match.