Spain: Tot Power Control sue Vodafone Spain and Huawei for patent infringement

The president of Vodafone Spain, Francisco Román, and its CEO, Antonio Coimbra, have denied that they were aware of agreements reached with Tot Power Control, a company that has accused them of patent infringement.

The current president of Vodafone Spain has given assurances that he did not know the terms of the contract signed between Vodafone Spain and Tot in 2008, since such technical details “do not have to be known by the CEO,” which was the position he held in those dates.

Tot Power Control, a division of Top Optimized Technologies, had developed a system over the last decade to improve the spectral efficiency of 3G environments. In 2002, Tot registered four patents, and in 2010 signed a collaboration memorandum with Vodafone. Then, in 2012, it signed an agreement with the telecoms giant Huawei to apply this technology in 25 countries in which Vodafone operates. However, in 2015 Vodafone informed Tot that it was no longer interested in the model, as Huawei had developed an alternative solution of its own.

According to Tot’s accusation, said system was identical to theirs and used the same code, which is why they decided to sue Huawei for disclosure of industrial secrets, breach of contract, patent infringement, and unfair competition, along with Vodafone as a facilitator of the violation.

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