Panasonic v OROPE Germany (CFI, 3 May 2024)

Date	3 May 2024
Court	CFI
Division	Munich (DE) Local Division
Type of action	Procedural Order
Registry reference	App_2352/2024 · ORD_11979/2024
Parties	Panasonic Holdings Corporation , Panasonic Holdings Corporation v. OROPE Germany GmbH, Guangdong OPPO Mobile Telecommunications Corp. 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.

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Dhenne Avocats · 10 October 2026

Our analysis

Summary

By an order of 3 April 2024 (UPC_CFI_208/2023, ACT_545535/2023, App_2352/2024 and App_14378/2024), the judge-rapporteur of the Munich Local Division (T. Pichlmaier), in an infringement action on a patent essential to the 3G and 4G standards between Panasonic and OPPO (published in anonymised form), ordered the production of licence agreements before the oral hearing in order to examine the FRAND defence. The order shows that the judge-rapporteur may organise FRAND evidence during the written procedure, without waiting for the relevance of the defence to be decided.

Question

May the judge-rapporteur, during the written procedure, order both parties to produce their licence agreements for the 4G standard while the relevance of the FRAND defence has not yet been established?

Decision

The relevance of the FRAND defence cannot be ruled out, even though other defences are raised. The judge-rapporteur prepares the oral hearing so as to avoid an adjournment (Rules 104(e), 114 and 118.6 RoP) without anticipating the panel’s decision. The Rules do not require relevance to be finally settled before production is ordered, since confidentiality tools are available and both sides seek the same information. The claimant must file with its Reply, the time for which was extended to 17 May 2024, its 4G licences covering mobile devices, licences granted by third-party licensors on patents it owned or owns, and two agreements of 2019, OPPO must file with its Rejoinder its licences covering 4G standard essential patents. The notion of « comparable licence agreements » was held too vague. Future licences and 3G-only licences are not relevant at this stage. Confidentiality requests are to follow the order of the Mannheim Local Division of 14 February 2024, English-language exhibits need not be translated.

Key points for practice

Practical point: in SEP litigation the judge-rapporteur may order cross-production of licences during the written procedure, requests must target defined categories, a request for « comparable licences » being rejected.

Provisions applied

Agreement on a Unified Patent Court: Art. 45 and 58 (relied on by the parties)
Rules of Procedure: Rules 29, 104(e), 114, 115, 118.6, 262 and 262A
Case law cited: Panasonic v Guangdong OPPO Mobile Telecomm, Mannheim Local Division, 14 February 2024 (UPC_CFI_210/2023)

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: Written procedure (UPC), Court fees and costs (UPC).

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

defendantOROPE Germany GmbH23 decisions in the corpus Follow this party
defendantGuangdong OPPO Mobile Telecommunications Corp. Ltd.24 decisions in the corpus Follow this party
claimantPanasonic Holdings Corporation47 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: Procedural Order
Outcome (Dhenne Avocats summary): Le juge rapporteur ordonne aux deux parties de produire des catégories définies de contrats de licence 4G, proroge le délai de réplique et renvoie la confidentialité au régime des règles 262 et 262A.
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.

Related decisions cited in the analyses

Panasonic v Guangdong OPPO Mobile Telecomm (CFI, 14 February 2024) cited in this record

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.

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