Xiaomi, one of the largest manufacturers of smartphones, smart devices, and IoT platforms, has joined the Open Invention Network (OIN), an organization focused on protecting the Linux ecosystem from patent claims. By joining OIN, the company has demonstrated its commitment to collaborative innovation and non-aggressive patent management. It is noteworthy that Linux and open technologies are key components of Xiaomi's products, and the company intends to continue the development and integration of open-source software into its products, as well as participate in the advancement of Linux and various open projects.
Participants in OIN agree not to file patent claims and freely allow the use of patented technologies in projects related to the Linux ecosystem. OIN includes over 3,500 companies, communities, and organizations that have signed a licensing agreement for collaborative patent sharing. Key members of OIN that help form the protective patent pool for Linux include companies such as Google, IBM, NEC, Toyota, Renault, SUSE, Philips, Red Hat, Alibaba, HP, AT&T, Juniper, Facebook, Cisco, Casio, Huawei, Fujitsu, Sony, and Microsoft.
Companies that sign the agreement gain access to the patents held by OIN in exchange for the commitment not to assert legal claims for the use of technologies employed in the Linux ecosystem. As part of joining OIN, Microsoft transferred to OIN participants the right to use more than 60 thousand of its patents, committing not to use them against Linux and open-source software.
The agreement among OIN participants only covers components of distributions that fall under the definition of a Linux system ('Linux System'). Currently, the list includes 3,393 packages, including the Linux kernel and the Android platform. KVM, Git, nginx, Apache Hadoop, CMake, PHP, Python, Ruby, Go, Lua, LLVM, OpenJDK, WebKit, KDE, GNOME, QEMU, Firefox, LibreOffice, Qt, systemd, X.Org, Wayland, PostgreSQL, MySQL, etc. In addition to the non-aggression commitments, a patent pool has been formed within OIN, where patents related to Linux that are acquired or freely transferred by participants are included.
The OIN patent pool includes over 1,300 patents. Among these, OIN holds a group of patents featuring some of the earliest mentions of dynamic web content creation technologies, which preceded the emergence of systems like Microsoft ASP, Sun/Oracle JSP, and PHP. Another significant contribution was the acquisition in 2009 of 22 Microsoft patents that had previously been sold to the AST consortium as patents related to open-source products. All OIN participants have the opportunity to use these patents free of charge. The validity of the OIN agreement was confirmed by a ruling from the U.S. Department of Justice, which required consideration of OIN's interests in the patent sale deal involving Novell.
Source: opennet.ru
